Indians win seventh straight

CLEVELAND -- Jim Thome busted out of another April slump with a grand slam and five RBIs Wednesday night as the Cleveland Indians won their seventh straight, 9-3 over the Minnesota Twins.\nThome's bat had been about the only thing missing so far this season for the Indians, 8-1 after winning the first three games of their four-game set with Minnesota.\nThome came in batting just .143 and hadn't hit a homer before connecting in the second inning off Rick Reed (1-1), who never should have had to face Thome.\nLast year, Thome batted .182 with three homers and 10 RBIs in the season's first month, but .307 with 46 homers and 114 RBIs the rest of the way.\nThome had two chances to hit a second slam, but struck out with the bases loaded in the sixth and eighth.\nDustan Mohr homered and Torii Hunter had three hits for the Twins, who never recovered after shortstop Cristian Guzman made two errors in the second, leading to six unearned runs.\nDanys Baez (2-0), a middle reliever last season but currently in Cleveland's rotation, gave three runs and six hits in 5 1-3 innings as Indians starters improved to 8-0 with a 3.04 ERA in nine games.\nAt the same juncture last season, Cleveland starters were 2-3 with a 6.89 ERA.\nAnd Cleveland's offense, which was supposed to have trouble scoring this season, is averaging an AL-best 6.7 runs per game.\nBaez was pulled after the Twins put two on in the sixth, but Mark Wohlers came on and struck out Corey Koskie and Mohr -- both looking -- to end the threat.\nWohlers, Jerrod Riggan and Charles Nagy combined for scoreless relief over the final three 2-3 innings.\nReed should have gotten out of the second inning unscathed, but Guzman, who led AL shortstops with 21 errors last season, made two in the span of three batters as the Indians scored six unearned runs to take a 7-2 lead.\nWith one out, Guzman lazily backhanded Ricky Gutierrez's grounder but had it roll up his glove for an error. After Milton Bradley singled, Einar Diaz hit a routine double-play ball at Guzman, who let it go through his legs and Gutierrez scored.\nMatt Lawton followed with an RBI single, and after Ellis Burks walked with two outs to load the bases, Thome officially ended his early season slump with his sixth career grand slam.\nThome, who came in with only one extra-base hit, gave the Indians a 1-0 lead in the first with an RBI double.\nTwo walks got Baez in trouble in the second and the Twins took a 2-1 lead on Mohr's RBI single and A.J. Pierzynski's sacrifice fly.\nReed allowed two earned runs and six hits in five innings.