The Kansas City Royals figure their offense will come around sooner or later. Until then, they’re happy to rely on a bullpen that keeps helping them eke out close wins.

Bruce Chen pitched into the sixth inning on three days’ rest and the Royals used four relievers to close out a 2-1 victory over the Houston Astros on Wednesday.

Alex Gordon tripled and scored for Kansas City, which took two of three from the Astros and has won seven of nine overall. Thirteen of Kansas City’s last 14 games have been decided by two or fewer runs, including six one-run games.

Manager Ned Yost smiled when asked what all these close games are doing to him.

”I’m fine. Piece of cake. We had them all the way,” he said.

Chen (6-6) struck out six in 5 2-3 innings and was charged with one run and five hits. Pitching on three days’ rest for the sixth time in his career, Chen bounced back from his last outing when he yielded six runs and seven hits in just 1 2-3 innings against St. Louis, but still received a no-decision in the Royals’ 10-7 loss.

Houston put runners on the corners with one out in the ninth, but Jonathan Broxton struck out Brian Bixler and retired Jordan Schafer to earn his 18th save in 21 chances.

”They’ve been doing it all year and once again they came up big today,” Gordon said of the bullpen. ”A 2-1 win, it feels like we’ve been doing that all year. I swear one of these days our offense is going to get rolling and we’re going to start giving the bullpen a rest. Hopefully it will come soon.”

Yost was impressed with Broxton’s poise in the ninth.

”The thing about him is he doesn’t panic,” Yost said. ”He stays calm and continues to make pitches.”

Kansas City’s pitchers have been particularly good late in games, posting a major league-best 1.31 ERA in the ninth inning or later. That performance has helped make up for an offense that has scored the second-fewest runs in the American League.

”We’ll start putting some big numbers up, but these wins are important, too,” third baseman Mike Moustakas said. ”These 2-1 wins, these nail-biters give us a lot of momentum going home.”

Houston starter Jordan Lyles (1-4) gave up two runs and three hits in seven innings. He has bounced around between the Astros and Triple-A Oklahoma City this season.

”I’ve been looking for an outing where I can just turn that corner,” Lyles said. ”Hopefully, this was it and that’s what I’m striving for. It is big because I know I can pitch up here and get outs.”

The Astros had eight hits, compared to just four for Kansas City, but they went 1 for 12 with runners in scoring position.

”It’s the key situations where we’re just not able to find the holes,” Houston manager Brad Mills said. ”There’s a lot of things we can point to like guys trying too hard, putting a little too much pressure on themselves. When you start to struggle in those situations, it starts to mount.”

The Royals grabbed a 1-0 lead in the fifth. Moustakas hit a leadoff double, moved up on Alcides Escobar’s grounder and scored on Brayan Pena’s infield out.

Gordon tripled with one out in the sixth and scored when Yuniesky Betancourt reached on an error by shortstop Jed Lowrie. Billy Butler then bounced into a double play to end the inning.

Houston got on the board in the bottom half, but lost out on a chance for a bigger rally.

Schafer and Carlos Lee opened the inning with consecutive walks, and Schafer moved to third when J.D. Martinez grounded into a double play. Lowrie drove in Schafer with an infield hit and Chris Johnson chased Chen with a single to left, but Kelvin Herrera struck out Chris Snyder to end the inning.

The Astros also had a chance to take the lead in the eighth. Lee hit a one-out single into right field, barely beating Jeff Francoeur’s throw to first. Martinez then walked before Greg Holland struck out Lowrie and Johnson.

Chen got into a jam in the fourth when Martinez doubled with one out and Lowrie was hit by a pitch. But he struck out Johnson and Snyder to end the threat.

Lyles got off to a great start, retiring 12 of his first 13 batters, including the first six.

— Associated Press —

Kansas City’s Luke Hochevar endured some good-natured ribbing from his teammates after pitching one of his best games of the season.

They found it funny that he was so happy about getting his first major league hit.

Hochevar pitched into the eighth inning, two relievers completed the shutout, and Billy Butler hit a solo home run to lead the Royals to a 2-0 win over the Houston Astros on Tuesday night.

One player yelled at reporters from the shower area in the clubhouse to make sure to ask him about his second-inning single. Jeff Francoeur and Butler continued to joke about it when asked about his pitching.

“Who cares about his outing, he got his first hit,” they both said one after another while chuckling.

Hochevar entered the game with nine strikeouts in 13 at-bats since 2008.

“It’s been a long time coming,” he said. “It hasn’t been pretty at all.”

Hochevar earned his first victory since May 12. He had four losses and two no-decisions since his previous win.

Kansas City manager Ned Yost raved about his work on the mound.

“That was a tremendous ball game by Luke Hochevar,” Yost said. “He’s getting back to who he is. His three core pitches, four-seam fastball, curveball, changeup are very effective together in combination.”

Hochevar (4-7) pitched no-hit ball into the fifth inning and allowed five hits and struck out six in a season-high 7 2/3 innings.

“I wish we could have got him through it,” Yost said of the eighth inning. “But I can’t live with myself if he gives up the lead in the eighth inning with our pen.”

Hochevar said he’s made some adjustments since the beginning of the season that are starting to come together for him.

“I think it helps more changing speeds, and I’m not so one-dimensional,” he said. “Changing speeds more has helped a lot.”

Aaron Crow and closer Jonathan Broxton combined to allow no hits in the last 1 1/3 innings to complete Kansas City’s seventh shutout this season. Broxton earned his 17th save.

Houston starter Wandy Rodriguez (6-5) yielded six hits and two runs in seven innings.

Butler put Kansas City up 1-0 with his two-out homer to the Crawford Boxes in left field in the first inning.

Yuniesky Betancourt singled to start the third, and scored on Alcides Escobar’s two-out single that rolled between Jed Lowrie and Jose Altuve and into the outfield to make it 2-0.

Rodriguez settled down after the first three innings and allowed just one hit in the next four innings. He was helped by his defense in the sixth when Justin Maxwell made a leaping catch at the wall in left field to rob Escobar of a hit.

“We need to find that rhythm right away,” Houston manager Brad Mills said of Rodriguez. “He couldn’t get in that rhythm (early on). When he got it, you saw how good he was.”

Rodriguez was replaced by Brandon Lyon, who allowed two hits in 1 1/3 innings.

Lowrie walked with two outs in the eighth inning before a single by Carlos Lee chased Hochevar. Lowrie reached third on the hit, which bounced off the wall in left field, and Lee advanced to second on an error by Alex Gordon.

Crow replaced Hochevar and struck out Justin Maxwell to end the inning.

Hochevar didn’t allow a hit until Chris Johnson’s one-out single in the fifth inning, which broke an 0-for-13 skid by the third baseman. Hochevar walked Lee and plunked Brian Bogusevic in the second before walking Rodriguez in the third.

“The breaking ball that Hochevar had, it was pretty good,” Mills said. “We had trouble making adjustments, as you obviously saw.”

Jason Castro singled after Johnson’s single before Rodriguez was out when Mike Moustakas dived to catch his pop bunt. Hochevar retired Jordan Schafer to end Houston’s threat.

Lowrie drew a walk with one out in the sixth, and Lee doubled down the right field line, but Hochevar escaped trouble again when he struck out Maxwell and Bogusevic.

— Associated Press —

It was a big moment for Houston’s Brian Bixler when he hit his first career home run in the first inning on Monday night.

Perhaps more important than that shot, though, was his two-run double in the eighth inning that helped pad Houston’s lead and allowed the Astros to hold on for a 9-7 win after a late rally by Kansas City.

Bixler drove in a career-high three runs on three hits and Justin Maxwell and Brian Bogusevic also homered for the Astros.

“It was a good way to start the day off,” Bixler said of his homer. “I was happy to continue that and put it together for the whole day. So it worked out well.”

J.A. Happ (5-7) yielded four hits and two runs in 6-plus innings to break a four-game losing streak. It was his first start since allowing 11 hits and eight runs — both career highs — in Houston’s 10-0 loss to San Francisco in which Matt Cain threw a perfect game.

Maxwell hit a two-run homer after Bogusevic’s solo shot in Houston’s five-run eighth inning.

Jonathan Sanchez (1-3) allowed six hits and four runs in six innings in his second start since a month-long stint on the disabled list with tendinitis in his left biceps.

Things got dicey for the Astros in the ninth with a tough outing by closer Brett Myers, who allowed four consecutive singles with one out to make it 9-3. The Royals got another run on a sacrifice fly by pinch-hitter Mitch Maier and Yuniesky Betancourt’s bases-loaded single scored two more.

Billy Butler had an RBI single to get Kansas City within 9-7 and bring loud boos from the crowd. The eighth hit of the inning, a single by Jeff Francoeur, chased Myers, bringing in Xavier Cedeno, who retired Mike Moustakas to get his first career save.

“It paid off today,” Bixler said of adding runs late. “It just kind of showed you that especially at this level, guys don’t give in and things happen. I’m glad we were able to do that in the eighth and hold onto it for J.A. Happ.”

Houston manager Brad Mills took the blame for Myers’ struggles.

“We’d like to get him out there a little more often so he could be a little crisper,” he said of Myers, who last pitched Thursday. “In his defense he’s been great all year, he’s going to continue to be great, it was just a situation where he hadn’t been out there in a while and that’s my fault.”

Bixler’s solo homer came on a shot to the Crawford Boxes in left field that tied it 1-1 in the first. Maxwell walked and later scored from first on an error by Sanchez when he badly missed a throw to first base on a pickoff attempt to make it 2-1.

Sanchez plunked Chris Johnson to start Houston’s fourth inning. Sanchez’s second botched pickoff attempt of the game allowed Johnson to advance to third, and he scored on a one-out single by Chris Snyder to make it 3-1.

After Johnson scored in the fourth, Jose Altuve was hit by a pitch with two outs before a single by Bixler loaded the bases. Maxwell walked to make it 4-1, but Sanchez retired Carlos Lee.

“Sanchez did all right,” Kansas City manager Ned Yost said. “He kept us in the game. The two pickoff throws hurt him. The two-out walk with the bases loaded hurt him.”

Betancourt tripled with one out in the first and scored on a two-out single by Francoeur to put Kansas City up 1-0.

Happ retired 13 of the next 14 batters before Alex Gordon doubled to start the sixth. Gordon advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored on a groundout by Butler to cut the lead to 4-2.

“He rebounded after the first inning, starting throwing some strikes and making pitches a little bit better,” Mills said of Happ. “It was sure nice to see him work as late as he did into the game.”

Bogusevic’s first-pitch homer in the eighth inning came off reliever Louis Coleman, who was recalled from Triple-A Omaha on Monday to help reinforce a bullpen that pitched nine innings in a 15-inning win over St. Louis on Sunday.

“We were strapped in the ‘pen,” Yost said. “We didn’t have the ability to match up tonight. We had to go as far as we could with Sanchez.”

Snyder walked and Altuve singled before Bixler sent them both home on a double to make it 7-2. Maxwell’s eighth homer of the season wrapped up Houston’s scoring.

— Associated Press —

Royals manager Ned Yost and outfielder Jeff Francoeur both had been ejected long before the ninth inning of Thursday night’s game against Milwaukee, so they had to settle for watching its dramatic conclusion on television.

They both saw Brayan Pena deliver an RBI single to tie the game.

Neither of them saw Jarrod Dyson cross home plate with the winning run.

“I don’t know what happened! They didn’t do a real good job of showing it on TV,” Yost said with a broad smile in the moments afterward. “Frenchy and I were watching it on TV and started pushing each other, and all of a sudden, Dyson is sliding across home plate.”

Pena had rounded first base when Brewers shortstop Edwin Maysonet cut off the throw from left field, and he made the mistake of firing to second base. That allowed the speedy Dyson to take off for home, his slide giving the Royals a 4-3 victory and three-game sweep.

“Ned had to pull me back because I was going to run out there and celebrate,” Francoeur said. “He had to remind me that you can’t go back down there after you’ve been thrown out.”

The wild ninth inning began when Mitch Maier reached first base while striking out on a wild pitch against Brewers closer John Axford (1-3), who also blew a save chance the previous night.

Milwaukee had pulled ahead in the eighth when Carlos Gomez singled off Luke Hochevar, and Maysonet laid down a sacrifice to get him into scoring position. Pinch-hitter Cody Ransom singled to left off reliever Jose Mijares to give Milwaukee the lead.

The run put Shaun Marcum in line to pick up his fourth straight win — at least, until everything unraveled for the second straight night for Axford.

He allowed Escobar’s two-run triple in the ninth inning on Wednesday night, and the Royals went on to win the game when Mike Moustakas drew a bases-loaded walk in the 11th inning.

“Even when I felt good today and was hitting my spots, except for one bad pitch, it still didn’t work out in my favor,” Axford said. “I felt great. Everything was coming out straight, everything was coming out fine.”

For a while, everything was going just fine.

Axford struck out Maier to lead off the ninth, but the pitch in the dirt skipped away and Maier went to first base. Axford rallied to retire Moustakas and Alcides Escobar.

That brought up the light-hitting Dyson, who managed to draw a walk. Pena came in to pinch hit for Humberto Quintero and singled to left, the start of a bizarre ending to a ballgame.

“I was trying to make good contact, put the ball in play,” Pena said. “I knew we had some speed on the base paths. I just tried to make something happen.”

Tim Collins (4-0) worked the ninth inning to pick up the win for the Royals, who wrapped up a three-game sweep to build some momentum for their upcoming road trip.

Ryan Braun and Aramis Ramirez each homered for Milwaukee, which got 7 2/3 innings from Shaun Marcum in one of his best performances of the year. The only real mistake he made was the two-run homer he served up to Eric Hosmer in the seventh inning.

“We played a good game until that last inning,” Brewers manager Ron Roenicke said. “Same thing. We let it get away again.”

Francoeur and Yost had both ended up in the clubhouse by the fourth inning.

The outfielder was ejected in the second inning by plate umpire Dan Iassogna for arguing a called third strike, and Yost was tossed when he started arguing with Iassogna over a bunt attempt by the Brewers’ Nyjer Morgan a couple of innings later.

It was a particularly embarrassing ejection for Francoeur, who is the namesake of a promotion for Thursday night home games. Fans can purchase tickets for $21 — his jersey number — and receive a T-shirt, drink coupon and seat in the “Frenchy Quarter” section overlooking right field.

Several hundred fans wearing the yellow shirts booed as Francoeur was ejected.

“I might have to invite them all out for a `Frenchy Quarter’ Wednesday,” he said.

— Associated Press —

The Kansas City Royals announced Thursday the club has signed second-round draft choice Sam Selman, the 66th overall selection in the 2012 First-Year Player Draft.

The 21-year-old Selman is a 6-foot-3, 185-pound left-hander from Vanderbilt University.  Selman was 9-3 for the Commodores in 2012, his junior season, with a 3.55 ERA in 17 games, including 13 starts.  The native of Austin, Texas, where he graduated from St. Andrews High School, helped lead Vanderbilt to the NCAA Regionals where they lost to North Carolina State.

The Royals have now signed 28 of the club’s 40 selections from last week’s First-Year Player Draft, including all of the top 11 picks.

— Royals Media Relations —

Mike Moustakas walked with the bases loaded in the 11th inning Wednesday night, giving the Kansas City Royals a come-from-behind 4-3 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers.

Billy Butler singled to lead off the inning against Kameron Loe (2-2), and Eric Hosmer drew a walk before Jeff Francoeur ripped a single to left field.

Third base coach Eddie Rodriguez threw up the stop sign on the lumbering Butler as he rounded third base, leaving them loaded for Moustakas, who walked on five pitches from Jose Veras to give the Royals a confidence-building victory.

Tim Collins (3-0) worked around a walk of his own in the 11th to earn the win for Kansas City, which came back from a 3-1 deficit with two outs in the ninth inning to force extra innings.

Alcides Escobar provided the damaging blow with a two-run triple off closer John Axford.

— Associated Press —