Baseball roundup: Friday's action on the diamonds

Returning from his suspension for violating baseball's drug policy, the Los Angeles slugger barely hit the ball out of the infield in the Dodgers' 6-3 win over the San Diego Padres on Friday night. With more than half the crowd at sold-out Petco Park wearing Dodger blue and cheering him on, Ramirez went 0-for-3 with a walk. The farthest he hit the ball was a popup that second baseman David Eckstein caught in shallow centre field.

He did show a good eye during his first at-bat, fouling off three pitches before walking. Right-hander Chad Gaudin brushed back Ramirez with the first pitch. Ramirez just smiled.

It was a loud at-bat, with Dodgers fans standing and cheering, and Padres fans trying to drown them out with boos.

"It was great," Ramirez said. "I was kind of nervous at first, but once I stepped to the plate I was fine."

Ramirez popped up to end the sixth, jogged to the dugout to get his glove and cap, then headed for the clubhouse, his night finished.

Elsewhere in the NL it was: St. Louis 7 Cincinnati 4; Pittsburgh 7 Florida 4; Atlanta 9 Washington 8; Philadelphia 7 New York 2; Chicago 2 Milwaukee 1 (10 innings); Colorado 5 Arizona 0 and San Francisco 13 Houston 0.

At San Diego, Ramirez was cheered when he caught Chase Headley's flyball to end the second inning. He took off his cap as he approached the dugout and gave a security guard a playful tap on the head with it.

There didn't appear to be any problems with the crowd. Some fans brought signs, including one in the left-field stands that read "RAMROID," and some fans wore yellow T-shirts that crudely mocked the slugger.

Ramirez's ban was based on evidence he used human chorionic gonadotropin, a fertility drug that's banned by baseball, a person familiar with the suspension told The Associated Press after the suspension was announced on May 7, speaking on condition of anonymity because those details were not released.

HCG is popular among steroid users because it can mitigate the side effects of ending a cycle of the drugs.

Rafael Furcal had a season-high four hits for the Dodgers and Russell Martin of Chelsea, Que., drove in two runs.

Hiroki Kuroda and four relievers combined to hold the Padres to four hits. Jonathan Broxton pitched a perfect ninth for his 12th straight save and 20th in 22 chances.

The Dodgers took a 5-0 lead in the first on four hits, two walks and two throwing errors on the same play.

With Ramirez on first and Furcal on second, first baseman Adrian Gonzalez fielded Ethier's grounder and forced Ramirez. Shortstop Everth Cabrera's return throw was wide of Gonzalez and caromed off the stands for an error. Gaudin tracked it down and his throw home was wide of catcher Eliezer Alfonzo, allowing Furcal to score.

James Loney and Martin had RBI singles, and Matt Kemp a two-run double.

Martin added an RBI single in the third.

Kuroda (3-4) allowed three runs and four hits in 5 1-3 innings. Gaudin (4-7) allowed six runs and seven hits in five innings.

San Diego's Scott Hairston hit a solo homer in the fourth, his 10th. Gonzalez hit a two-run double in the sixth.

Cardinals 7 Reds 4

At Cincinnati, Albert Pujols hit his club-record fourth grand slam of the season, and Jarrett Hoffpauir drove in the go-ahead runs in the ninth inning with his first career hit as St. Louis beat the Reds..

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Pirates 7 Marlins 4

At Miami, Brandon Moss and Ramon Vazquez homered and Charlie Morton pitched six shutout innings for Pittsburgh.

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Braves 9 Nationals 8

At Washington, pinch-hitter Brooks Conrad hit a go-ahead three-run homer in the seventh inning and Atlanta won its season-high fifth straight.

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Phillies 7 Mets 2

At Philadelphia, Rodrigo Lopez took a three-hitter into the seventh inning in his first outing in two years, helping the Phillies snap a six-game home losing streak.

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Cubs 2 Brewers 1 (10 innings)

At Chicago, Jake Fox drew a bases-loaded walk from Mark DiFelice to force in the winning run with two outs in the 10th inning.

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Rockies 5 Diamondbacks 0

At Denver, Jorge De La Rosa pitched eight innings and Ian Stewart hit a solo homer for Colorado. 74.

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Giants 13 Astros 0

At San Francisco, Pablo Sandoval hit a two-run homer to stake rookie Ryan Sadowski to an early lead and the Giants thumped Houston.

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Shin-Soo Choo gave his high school baseball coach a fitting tribute.

Choo learned before batting practice that his coach had died of cancer. Then he homered twice and drove in a career-high seven runs in a 15-3 victory over the Oakland Athletics on Friday night that snapped Cleveland's five-game losing streak.

"I'll never forget this game," said Choo, who helped South Korea to the championship game of the World Baseball Classic in March.

"If I was told before the game I would do this, I wouldn't believe it," he added. "He was almost a like a second dad."

Choo had an RBI single, two-run double, three-run homer and capped his night with a solo shot, his 12th. It was Choo's second career multi-homer game and the most RBIs by a Cleveland player since Grady Sizemore drove in seven Aug. 21 against Kansas City.

Choo arrived early at Progressive Field to work with hitting coach Derek Shelton. He had watched three hours of video on the off-day Thursday and wanted to make some adjustments at the plate - even though he had raised his average to .292 by hitting .309 over his previous 48 games.

"Why change?" Choo responded to a question. "Because I want to get better."

Cleveland, with the worst record in the American League at 32-49, could use it. The Indians won for only the third time in 16 games.

Elsewhere in the AL it was: New York 4 Toronto 2; Seattle 7 Boston 6 (11 innings); Texas 3 Tampa Bay 1; Chicago 5 Kansas City 0; Detroit 11 Minnesota 9 (16 innings); and Baltimore 6 Los Angeles 4.

At Cleveland, Asdrubal Cabrera had three RBIs in the Indians' biggest output since a 22-4 win at Yankee Stadium on April 18. They scored only 13 runs and batted .195 during their five-game losing skid.

David Huff (4-3) gave up five doubles, but only three runs over six innings to improve to 4-1 in his last six starts.

Oakland, which had given up only 10 runs over its previous four games, opened a nine-game trip by losing for the seventh time in nine games.

"Cleveland hasn't been swinging the bats that great lately," Oakland manager Bob Geren said. "We've been throwing the ball pretty well. It happens. It's one game."

Rookie Trevor Cahill (5-7) was wild and was hurt by some shaky fielding. The right-hander gave up five earned runs over 3 2-3 innings, walking four. Three more runs scored after two throwing errors by third baseman Bobby Crosby.

"When you get behind in the count, they can sit dead red," Cahill said. "They know what's coming and they usually hit it."

The Athletics scored in each of the first two innings to go up 2-0. Matt Holliday had an RBI groundout in the first, and Nomar Garciaparra a run-scoring double in the second. Huff stranded Garciaparra by getting three straight strikeouts.

"Huff continues to come around as a big-league starter," Indians manager Eric Wedge said. "A couple of innings could have got away from him, but he adjusted and worked through it."

Travis Hafner hit his ninth homer to get Cleveland to 2-1 in the bottom half.

Two bad throws by Crosby in the third helped the Indians go ahead, 4-2.

Ben Francisco reached when Crosby fielded his slow roller and threw wildly. Francisco scored on a two-out single by Choo to tie it 2-2. After Hafner walked to load the bases, Jhonny Peralta topped a bouncer to Crosby, whose throw was offline to first baseman Garciaparra as two runs scored.

Jack Cust's RBI single got Oakland to 4-3 in the fourth.

Choo's two-run double keyed a four-run bottom half. Cabrera and Peralta had RBI singles in the rally.

Yankees 4 Blue Jays 2

At New York, A.J. Burnett scattered six hits over seven innings and Robinson Cano and Alex Rodriguez homered for the Yankees.

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Mariners 7 Red Sox 6 (11 innings)

At Boston, Rob Johnson doubled home two runs in the 11th inning as Seattle beat the Red Sox.

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Rangers 3 Rays 1

At Arlington, Texas, Tommy Hunter earned his first career victory on his 23rd birthday and Hank Blalock homered for the Rangers, who won their third straight.

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White Sox 5 Royals 0

At Kansas City, Mo., John Danks threw 7 1-3 shutout innings and got a big lift from reliever Scott Linebrink as Chicago won its seventh straight.

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Tigers 11 Twins 9 (16 innings)

At Minneapolis, Placido Polanco hit two extra-inning RBI singles, the second giving Detroit the lead for good in the 16th inning of a victory over Minnesota.

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Orioles 6 Angels 4

At Anaheim, Calif., Aubrey Huff hit a three-run homer and Luke Scott doubled home two runs as Baltimore beat Los Angeles.