ARLINGTON, Texas — Trot Nixon hit a tiebreaking grand slam in the eighth inning and the Boston Red Sox beat the Texas Rangers 7-4 Friday night.
The Red Sox improved to 5-0 against Texas this season. Boston began the day two games behind Oakland in the wild card race and four games behind New York in the AL East.
Troy O'Leary led off the Boston eighth with a single against Chris Michalak (6-8), making his first appearance for Texas after being claimed off waivers from Toronto. Shea Hillenbrand singled off Danny Kolb and Doug Mirabelli drew a one-out walk that loaded the bases.
Nixon followed with a line drive off Kolb that just cleared the right-field wall for his third career grand slam and 20th homer of the season.
Rod Beck (6-4) allowed one run and two hits in one inning for the win. Ugueth Urbina pitched the ninth for his fourth save.
TWINS 9, ROYALS 3: Luis Rivas hit a leadoff home run and the Minnesota Twins won for only the third time in 15 games, beating the Kansas City Royals.
The Twins' recent slump had dropped them out of first place in the AL Central and put them 6 1/2 games behind Cleveland.
Eric Milton (12-5) held the Royals to one run and seven hits in six innings. He is 3-0 against the Royals this season and 9-2 in his career.
Eddie Guardado got four outs for his fourth save.
BLUE JAYS 5, ORIOLES 0: Chris Carpenter pitched seven shutout innings to break his seven-game losing streak and the Toronto Blue Jays scored all their runs with two outs in a victory over the Baltimore Orioles.
Baltimore's Cal Ripken marked his 41st birthday by going 1-for-4, the 46th time in his last 52 games that he got at least one hit.
Carpenter (8-11) had gone 10 starts without a victory since defeating the Orioles on June 26.
Jason Johnson (10-9) allowed five runs and 10 hits in the second complete game of his career. He lost his other complete game — in Carpenter's previous win.
WHITE SOX 5, DEVIL RAYS 4: AL ERA leader Mark Buehrle won his fifth straight decision, Paul Konerko drove in four runs and the Chicago White Sox beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
The White Sox won their fourth game in a row.
MARINERS 4, INDIANS 1: Jamie Moyer won his sixth consecutive decision, Ichiro Suzuki extended his hitting streak to 21 games and the Seattle Mariners won their fourth straight game.
The Mariners (93-36) ended Cleveland's three-game winning streak and clinched the season series against the Indians for the first time in four years.
Seattle is 4-1 vs. Cleveland this season, with the Indians' only win a 15-14 victory in 11 innings Aug. 5 in Cleveland when they overcame a 12-run deficit.
TIGERS 8, ATHLETICS 4: Tony Clark and Jose Macias each drove in two runs as the Detroit Tigers snapped out of a prolonged scoring drought and beat the slumping Oakland Athletics.
After going 15 consecutive games without scoring more than five runs, the Tigers found their offense at the expense of Tim Hudson in his worst start of the year.
Hudson (14-7) allowed a season-high eight runs on 12 hits. He walked two and struck out one as the A's lost their fourth straight and saw their wild card lead over Boston shrink to one game.
ANGELS 6, YANKEES 2: Garret Anderson singled home two runs to key a four-run Anaheim outburst in the seventh inning as the Angels downed the New York Yankees.
Shigetoshi Hasegawa (4-4) shut out the Yankees for 1 2/3 innings to get the win. Starter Jarrod Washburn struggled for six innings but still held New York to two runs.