Miguel Cabrera hit a two-run homer, Anibal Sanchez carried a perfect game into the sixth inning and the Detroit Tigers held on to beat the Kansas City Royals 6-4 Sunday to salvage a split of their four-game series.
Alex Avila also drove in three runs for the Tigers, who dropped the first two games of the series before squeaking out a 2-1 victory behind David Price’s masterpiece Saturday night.
Sanchez (2-3) was just as good as his rotation mate. The right-hander did not allow a runner until Paulo Orlando dribbled a single up the middle leading off the sixth inning, and Sanchez wound up allowing three runs on four hits over 7 1-3 innings.
Kansas City nearly bailed out Jeremy Guthrie (1-2) by scoring two runs in the seventh and two more in the eighth. But Tom Gorzelanny struck out Eric Hosmer to leave a runner aboard, and Joakim Soria shut down his former team in the ninth for his 10th save.
