Royals blank A’s behind 11 Ks from Cole Ragans

Dairon Blanco hit his first major league home run, Cole Ragans struck out a career-high-tying 11 batters, and the Kansas City Royals avoided a three-game sweep at the hands of the host Oakland Athletics, 4-0 on Wednesday afternoon.

Bobby Witt Jr. also homered for the Royals, whose four runs were enough this time after they'd dropped the first two games of the series 6-4 and 5-4.

After A's opener Adrian Martinez (0-2) had matched zeroes with Ragans for two innings, Blanco launched a solo home run leading off the top of the third. The 30-year-old rookie was making his 103rd career plate appearance.

The Royals tacked on a pair of runs in the fourth. Drew Waters tripled home Matt Beaty and later scored on a Maikel Garcia sacrifice fly.

Witt bombed his 26th homer of the season to complete the scoring leading off the fifth.

The four runs were more than enough for Ragans (5-4) and three relievers, who combined on a two-hitter. Both hits came off Ragans in his six innings, but he issued no walks.

The 11 strikeouts equaled the number he'd had earlier this month at Boston.

Taylor Clarke, Jackson Kowar and Carlos Hernandez combined for three hitless innings to complete the shutout.

The closest the A's came to scoring came in the eighth when, attempting to protect the 4-0 lead, Kowar walked three of the four men he faced.

Hernandez came in and, despite going to a full count on both batters, got Seth Brown to pop up and Zack Gelof to ground out, before coasting through an uneventful ninth for his third save.

Martinez took the loss, allowing one run on three hits in 2 1/3 innings. He walked one and struck out three.

Blanco reached base on three of his four plate appearances, adding a pair of walks to his home run, while Witt finished with two hits for the Royals, who out-hit the A's 5-2.

Jonah Bride, who led off the last of the first with a single, and Nick Allen had the only hits for the A's, who were shooting for just their second three-game series sweep of the season.