Seattle sets sights on A’s

Mariners three back in West after 9-3 victory

? Ben Davis saw the plate and nothing else. He charged home, knocked down the catcher and umpire and scored for Seattle.

The Mariners are set on making the AL West interesting until the very end — even if they have to run over people to do it.

Ichiro Suzuki had four hits and drove in a career-high five runs, and Bret Boone added three hits and two RBIs as Seattle beat the first-place Oakland Athletics for the second straight day, 9-3, Saturday.

“This is a great opportunity for us to jump up, stand up and be heard,” Seattle’s Mike Cameron said.

Oakland’s division lead dropped to three games over Seattle, and the A’s magic number to win the West remained at five. Any combination of A’s wins and Mariners losses totaling five would give Oakland its second straight division title.

“We’re desperate,” Davis said. “It’s a good time to be greedy. No one wants to go home at the end of the season.”

The Mariners scored both of their sixth-inning runs with hard home-plate collisions that made it tough for the A’s to make a play. Mike Wood threw a wild pitch that allowed Cameron to come home from third, and Seattle’s center fielder ran into the pitcher at the plate after Wood failed to control an errant throw from catcher Ramon Hernandez.

Davis then leveled Hernandez and knocked the ball from his hands to score minutes later. Umpire Joe West even fell over on that one.

Hernandez left the game two innings later because of a bruised elbow, but manager Ken Macha believed he would play today in the series finale.

Cameron and pitcher Joel Pineiro fought to be the first ones to reach Davis and offer their congratulations for making such a clutch play. It gave the Mariners momentum — “That’s big Ben,” Suzuki said. “That type of play proved we are into the game and it gives us more enthusiasm.”

“Ben Davis, hats off to him,” Cameron said. “That’s like my ultimate dream, to erupt the crowd. That was nice.”

The 6-foot-4, 225-pound Davis said he was trying to lower his body to avoid getting injured, and he didn’t see West in his way.

“I just tried to get a little lower … and go for the brunt,” Davis said. “It’s not my intent to hurt anybody. I was just zoning everything out to try to score runs. That symbolizes what we were doing early in the year — playing good, hard, aggressive baseball.”

Pineiro (15-11) calmly worked out of jams to win for just the second time in nine starts. After giving up a leadoff walk to Eric Byrnes in the fifth, Pineiro retired the next nine Oakland batters.

Suzuki’s two-run single in the fourth gave him 200 hits for the third straight season, and his other three hits were doubles.

Twins 7, Tigers 3

Minneapolis — Johan Santana won his eighth straight decision, and Matthew LeCroy and Dustan Mohr homered as Minnesota beat Detroit. The Twins cut their magic number for winning the Central Division to five with their eighth straight win and 11th victory in 12 home games.

Detroit lost its eighth straight and fell to 18-59 on the road this season. The Tigers, at 38-116, need to win five of their final eight games to avoid tying the record for most losses in a season. Only the 1916 Philadelphia Athletics (36-117) and the 1962 New York Mets (40-120) have lost more than Detroit.

Santana (12-3) allowed three earned runs on four hits in 52/3 innings. He struck out five and walked two, the first walks issued by a Twins starter in 302/3 innings during the homestand.

Indians 13, Red Sox 4

Cleveland — Cleveland scored 12 runs in its final two at-bats and tightened the AL wild-card race. Casey Blake’s two-run double triggered a seven-run rally in the seventh inning when Cleveland chased Derek Lowe (16-7), who dominated the Indians for six.

Josh Bard hit a leadoff homer off Lowe in the seventh, and Cleveland’s rookie catcher capped the unexpected inning with a two-run single.

The Indians added five more runs in the eighth, turning what looked like a sure loss into a surprising blowout win.

Boston’s loss allowed Seattle to move 11/2 games behind the Red Sox for the wild card with eight games remaining.

Yankees 7, Devil Rays 1

St. Petersburg, Fla. — Andy Pettitte became a 20-game winner for the second time, and New York clinched its ninth straight playoff berth by beating Tampa Bay. The AL East leaders won for the 12th time in 14 games to climb a season-high 38 games over .500, move closer to their sixth consecutive division title and earn at least a wild-card spot in the postseason.

Devil Rays reliever Jon Switzer was ejected in the ninth inning after New York’s Derek Jeter was hit by a pitch for the second straight inning. Brandon Backe plunked the Yankees’ shortstop in the eighth, and Switzer hit Bernie Williams later in the inning.

Rangers 13, Angels 4

Arlington, Texas — Alex Rodriguez homered twice to extend his major-league lead to 46, and Hank Blalock hit his first career grand slam as Texas beat Anaheim.

Orioles 2, Blue Jays 1

Baltimore — Luis Matos hit a solo homer and later scored the winning run on Jay Gibbons’ bloop single in the eighth as Baltimore edged Toronto. Kerry Ligtenberg (3-2) earned the win after getting the final out of the eighth.