CLEVELAND (AP) — As Omar Infante prepared for a postgame TV interview, teammate Salvador Perez dumped a bucket of Gatorade over his head, soaking Kansas City’s second baseman to the bone.
Well, that finally cooled him off.
Infante drove in a career-high seven runs and the Royals overcame some early sloppiness for an 8-4 win over the Cleveland Indians on Thursday night.
A veteran infielder making his first start in 11 days, Infante hit a three-run homer in the second inning off Corey Kluber (8-14), added a two-run double in the fifth after the Indians pulled their ace and hit a two-run single in the seventh.
Infante also had a sacrifice and nearly matched the offensive output of teammate Mike Moustakas, who set a team record with nine RBIs on Saturday against Baltimore. Needing a triple to hit for the cycle, Infante lined out to center field in the ninth.
Afterward, he treated his big night like it was nothing unusual.
“I’m grateful for the chance to play,” Infante said. “It felt good.”
Yordana Ventura (12-8) went five innings, retiring struggling All-Star Jason Kipnis with the bases loaded to end the fifth as the AL Central-leading Royals, who had three errors in the first three innings and four overall, split the four-game series. Kansas City won for just the fourth time in 13 games.
Infante has hit two homers this season — both in Cleveland.
“I get lucky in this park,” he said, laughing. “I put some good swings on the ball here.”
The Indians didn’t make up any more ground in the wild-card race. They came in trailing Houston by four games for the second spot.
Cleveland loaded the bases in the ninth, prompting Royals manager Ned Yost to bring in closer Greg Holland, who gave up a sacrifice fly but got his 32nd save.
Kluber started for the first time since Aug. 29 after being sidelined with a hamstring injury. The reigning AL Cy Young Award winner allowed two runs and five hits in four innings, settling in after Infante’s homer.
But as soon as Kluber left, the Royals pounced on left-handed reliever Kyle Crockett, who gave up Eric Hosmer’s RBI double that put Kansas City up 4-2. Jeff Manship came on for Cleveland but walked Alex Rios, and Infante followed with his double to make it 6-2.
Infante’s second double pushed Kansas City’s lead to 8-3 in the seventh.
“We just made some mistakes to Infante tonight,” Indians manager Terry Francona said. “When we got it where we needed to we were OK, but when we didn’t he killed us.”
With a large lead in the division, the Royals have been on cruise control lately and not playing as well as they did earlier in the season.
They didn’t start out smoothly in the series finale, committing three errors — two on pretty routine grounders — in the first three innings.