ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) – Juan Rivera hit a pair of three-run homers, Bartolo Colon won his fifth straight decision, and the Los Angeles Angels beat the Boston Red Sox 13-4 Thursday night in the series opener between AL division leaders.
Rivera homered on the second pitch from Mike Myers after Red Sox knuckleballer Tim Wakefield left the game in the fifth inning when he got hit in the right ankle on a comebacker by Casey Kotchman.
The Angels extended their AL West lead to 2 games over idle Oakland. Boston’s lead over the idle New York Yankees dropped to four games in the East.
Colon (16-6) allowed three runs and eight hits in seven innings, struck out five and walked none. At one point, the right-hander retired 11 consecutive batters. Wakefield (13-9) gave up six runs and seven hits in 4 1-3 innings, struck out five and walked four. Rivera added his second three-run shot and 11th of the season with two outs in the eighth off Mike Remlinger.
Clinging to a 1-0 lead, the Angels broke open the game with six runs in the fifth inning, tying a season high.
Kotchman and Darin Erstad each had two RBIs as the Angels stopped a two-game losing streak.
Mired in a 4-for-23 slump in his previous eight games, Kotchman homered to lead off the second inning for the Angels’ first run.
Los Angeles piled on in the fifth. Erstad’s RBI single scored Orlando Cabrera, who took third on a two-base throwing error by Manny Ramirez, making it 2-0.
Erstad scored his 800th career run on a single by Bengie Molina, then Kotchman’s RBI single hit Wakefield, allowing Vladimir Guerrero to score for a 4-0 lead.
Rivera’s three-run homer extended the Angels’ lead to 7-0. They added a run in the sixth on a RBI groundout by Erstad.
Boston made it 8-3 in the seventh on a run-scoring single by Kevin Millar and a two-run single by Gabe Kapler. Bill Mueller homered in the ninth.
The Angels added two runs on a bases-loaded single by Chone Figgins with two outs in the seventh.
Notes: The season series is tied 2-2. … The Angels are 13-13 against the AL East, with their next nine games against the division. … Rivera had the second multihomer game of his career and his second six-RBI game. Both were previously done on June 19, 2004, against the Chicago White Sox.
AP-ES-08-19-05 0105EDT
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