Streak ends as M's lose in extra innings

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- David DeJesus homered, doubled twice and scored the winning run on Emil Brown's sacrifice fly in the 11th to nudge the Kansas City Royals past Seattle 3-2 tonight, stopping the Mariners' eight-game winning streak and making John McLaren a loser in his first game as manager.

DeJesus, who homered in the third and doubled and scored in the first, doubled over the head of right fielder Jose Guillen leading off the 11th. After Brandon Morrow (3-2) walked Esteban German, Mark Teahen laid down a sacrifice bunt moving DeJesus to third. Brown ended it with a fly ball to center.

Octavio Dotel (1-1) earned his first win for the Royals, striking out the side in the 11th in between giving up two scratch singles.

McLaren was promoted to manager on Sunday when Mike Hargrove surprised the Mariners with his resignation, insisting he was not ailing and had not been pressured to quit but had simply lost his passion for the game. After his announcement, the Mariners beat Toronto 2-1 and headed to Kansas City on an eight-game streak. The Elias Sports Bureau said no manager had resigned during such a long winning streak since at least 1900.

Although Hargrove, in McLaren's words, had "not been himself," for two weeks the Mariners had won eight in a row and 10 of 11 and climbed to within four games of the Angels in the AL West.

The Royals had the potential winning run on third in both the ninth and 10th but Brown and Alex Gordon struck out to end the ninth and Joey Gathright struck out for the third out in the 10th.

DeJesus' home run, his fifth, was his first in 247 at-bats.

Seattle starter Felix Hernandez went eight innings and allowed only five hits and two runs. He struck out five and allowed only one walk for the sixth time in seven starts.

Guillen, who hit a game-tying home run in Hargrove's emotional last game Sunday and then won it with an RBI single in the ninth, handed Hernandez a first-inning lead with a two-run single that scored Jose Vidro and Raul Ibanez in the first. But the Mariners did not get a runner past second the rest of the night.

Kansas City starter Gil Meche, a former Mariner who was named to the All-Star team on Sunday, then gave up a single to Richie Sexon and faced runners at first and second with only one out. But he got out of the inning and allowed only two singles and one walk from that point on until walking Yuniesky Betancourt with one out in the seventh and giving way to reliever Jimmy Gobble.

Meche went 6 1-3 innings and gave up two runs on five hits, with three walks and a strikeout. It was the only outing all year in which he did not have at least three strikeouts.

Notes: 1B Sexson left the game in the bottom of the ninth with a contusion of the left thumb and was listed as day-to-day. He was replaced by Ben Broussard. ... Bell, a good friend of Hargrove, was saddened to hear of his departure. "I know how much he cares about the players and cares about his job and cares about seeing it through," Bell said. "Unfortunately a lot of managers cant see their job all the way through." ... Ibanez returned to left field after missing six games with a strained left hamstring.