AL CENTRAL Double trouble defeats Tribe

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Jimmy Gobble made baseball history by simply throwing an inside fastball to Ron Belliard.
With that pitch, Kansas City became the first major league team to start four different left-handers in its first four games.
And yet another lefty, Aaron Guiel, broke a scoreless tie with a two-run double in the seventh in the Royals' 3-1 victory over the Cleveland Indians on Friday night.
"Coming to the park I wasn't really thinking about the four straight left-handers," said the 22-year-old rookie, who faced just one batter over the minimum in six dominating innings.
Becoming a footnote to history, in fact, was the furthest thing from his mind.
"I just wanted to go out there and compete," he said. "But now that I've done it, it's definitely cool. It's something you're going to remember."
Double play woes
Gobble's sixth major league start was memorable no matter how many lefties the Royals had started ahead of him.
He gave up two walks and Matt Lawton's one-out single in the second, and both runners who walked were taken out in double plays.
Gobble, who was slowed in spring training by a strained abdominal muscle and on a strict pitch limit, threw 74 pitches, 49 for strikes.
"He was in command all night long," Royals manager Tony Pena said.
Gobble was preceded by Brian Anderson, Darrell May and Jeremy Affeldt.
Ken Harvey hit a two-out single in the seventh off Jack Cressend (0-1), who had relieved after Jason Stanford pitched five scoreless innings.
Stewart gives up double
After Benito Santiago singled off the glove of second baseman Ron Belliard, left-hander Scott Stewart came in to face Guiel and gave up a two-run double.
Tony Graffanino then made it 3-0 with an RBI single for the Royals, who stranded 12 runners.
"I went up there trying not to think about how many scoring chances we'd already wasted," said
Jason Grimsley (1-0) pitched the seventh. Curtis Leskanic allowed a RBI single to Casey Blake in the ninth before getting his first save.
"Gobble kept us off balance," Cleveland manager Eric Wedge said. "He did a good job. We just never got anything going against him. He took us out of our game."
Several teams had lefties start their first four games, but one always pitched more than once. The 1994 Yankees were the last to do it starting Jimmy Key twice, Terry Mulholland and Jim Abbott, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
The streak
The game was delayed for about eight minutes in the ninth inning when a streaker leaped onto the field from behind third base and ran into deep center field. He was surrounded by nine security officers and led away after a towel was retrieved from the Royals bullpen and placed around him.
Stanford, who was making his ninth major league start, went five innings plus two batters and gave up seven hits -- six never left the infield -- with four walks and two strikeouts.
"Very frustrating," Stanford said. "Just one of those nights where you have pretty good stuff. I've had a dead arm and tonight my arm felt really good."
The Royals' first seven baserunners came on two walks and five infield hits off Stanford.
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