Cleveland ? It has been 63 days since the Cleveland Indians were anywhere but last in the Central Division. Mark DeRosa’s grand slam in the seventh inning changed all of that.

DeRosa’s slam off reliever Jamey Wright led Cleveland to an 8-4 victory over the Kansas City Royals in a matchup of the two worst teams in the division. The Indians scored four runs in each of the sixth and seventh innings to move a half-game ahead of the Royals, who have lost 10 of their last 11 and 22 of their last 28.

Cleveland had been in last place since April 8.

“We’ve battled hard,” DeRosa said. “But at the same time, we feel like we’re capable of way more than being one game above the cellar.”

Rafael Perez (1-1) pitched two-thirds of an inning for the win.

The Indians loaded the bases off Juan Cruz (3-2) in the seventh with a fielder’s choice, walk and a hit batsman. Cruz, who began the year as Kansas City’s top setup man, has allowed eight earned runs over his last three innings, spanning four appearances.

Wright relieved Cruz, and DeRosa hit his second pitch into the seats in right field for his 10th home run of the season. It was the fifth grand slam of DeRosa’s career and third for the Indians this season.

“I just wanted to get the guy in from third,” DeRosa said. “Sometimes you try so hard to get everybody in, you end up failing. Whenever you come up in those situations in a tie game, you want to be sure to get one in.”

He did much better than that. Wright threw two cutters to DeRosa. The first blew past him for a strike. The second landed in the right field seats.

“The first pitch was a lot worse than that one,” Wright said. “It was away, it was just up a little bit. He got it up in the air and it kept going.”

DeRosa, acquired from the Chicago Cubs during the winter, has played first base, third base, right field and left field for the Indians. He now leads the team with 42 RBIs.

“He’s had a lot of big hits this year,” Indians manager Eric Wedge said.