Hunter Dozier had five hits, Andrew Benintendi and Ryan O’Hearn homered, and the Kansas City Royals beat the Colorado Rockies 14-10 in Denver on Friday night.
Michael A. Taylor and Benintendi had three hits apiece, Salvador Perez and Whit Merrifield each had two hits and Dylan Coleman (1-1) pitched an inning of relief to earn the win for Kansas City.
Brendan Rodgers homered among his three hits, Sam Hilliard had two hits and also went deep, C.J. Cron finished with three hits and Ryan McMahon had two hits for the Rockies.
Kansas City outhit Colorado 18-13.
The Royals took the lead on Benintendi’s two-run homer in the first inning, his second of the season.
Colorado struck back in the second inning. Rodgers doubled and Elias Diaz reached on an error to put runners on the corners.
Iglesias followed with a single to drive in Rodgers, Hilliard’s single brought home Diaz and advanced Iglesias to third, and he scored on Yonathan Diaz’s sacrifice fly to make it 3-2.
Kansas City answered in the next inning. Perez had an RBI double, Dozier drove in another with a single and Bobby Witt Jr.’s two-run triple made it 6-3, and the Royals added to it in the fifth.
Dozier doubled with one out and scored on Rodgers’ error on Witt’s grounder, and he scored on Taylor’s RBI single that ended Kyle Freeland’s night.
Freeland (1-4) allowed eight runs — six earned — on 12 hits and walked two in 4 2/3 innings.
Colorado responded in the fifth off Zack Greinke. McMahon laced an RBI single, Randal Grichuk reached on a third-strike wild pitch, which allowed another run to score, and Rodgers followed with a two-run double to make it 8-7 and chase Greinke.
Greinke allowed seven runs — five earned — on eight hits in 4 2/3 innings.
Kansas City put four more runs up in the seventh on an RBI double by Taylor, a two-run single from Merrifield and a run-scoring triple by Benintendi.
Rodgers hit a two-run homer in the bottom of the seventh — his second — but O’Hearn’s pinch-hit, two-run shot in the eighth got the runs back.
Hilliard led off the eighth with his first homer of the season.
–Field Level Media
