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• MLB: Harper's grand slam lifts Phillies to 7th straight win

  Bryce Harper belted a grand slam and Cristopher Sanchez pitched seven strong innings as the red-hot Philadelphia Phillies extended their winning streak to seven games with a 10-1 rout of the Toronto Blue Jays on Tuesday.

  Kody Clemens homered, tripled and tied a career high with four RBIs as the Phillies won their 11th in a row at home and 18th in 21 games overall.

  Philadelphia leads the majors with 26 victories and has had more wins through 37 games just twice before, in 1976 and 1993, when it started 27-10 in both seasons.

  Sanchez limited the Blue Jays to one run on six hits with two walks and five strikeouts.

  Jose Berrios entered play leading the majors with a 1.44 ERA but was tagged for eight runs and seven hits in 3 2/3 innings. He gave up more runs against the Phillies than the seven runs in seven starts over 43 2/3 innings before this game.

  Harper chased Berrios with a drive to right with two outs in the fourth to put the Phillies ahead 8-0.

  Harper is 6 for 11 with three home runs and 10 RBIs in his last three games.

   

  Yamamoto, Muncy keep Dodgers surging

  Yoshinobu Yamamoto pitched a season-high eight innings and was backed by Max Muncy’s first-inning grand slam as the Los Angeles Dodgers won their sixth in a row, 8-2 over the Miami Marlins.

  Yamamoto allowed two runs and five hits without a walk and struck out five to win his third straight start.

  Jazz Chisholm Jr. homered on Yamamoto’s first pitch of the game, but the Dodgers answered with four runs in the bottom half against Edward Cabrera, who walked two and hit Freddie Freeman before Muncy went deep for the ninth time this season.

  Gavin Lux hit a two-run homer to cap a four-run third for Los Angeles, which has won 13 of 15 and outscored opponents 42-11 during the six-game run.

   

  
  Rangers score 10 in 2nd in win over Athletics

  Marcus Semien had two hits and three RBIs during a 10-run second inning and the Texas Rangers rolled to a 15-8 rout of the Oakland Athletics.

  Semien finished with four hits and five RBIs, Jonah Heim went 4 for 4 with two RBIs and three runs and Leody Taveras had three hits, two RBIs and three runs as the Rangers won their fourth straight.

  Texas sent 16 batters to the plate in the second in its biggest inning since May 13, 2015, when it scored 10 in the third against the Yankees.

  Ross Stripling allowed a career-high 11 runs – five earned – and 10 hits in 1 2/3 innings.

  Kyle McCann and Seth Brown homered for Oakland, which lost its third in a row after six consecutive wins.

• Madrid champion Swiatek keen to maintain level at Italian Open

  Iga Swiatek will not rest on her laurels after overcoming Aryna Sabalenka in last week's Madrid Open final, pledging to learn from that gruelling battle ahead of the Italian Open.

  Swiatek toppled Sabalenka in an enthralling battle between the world's top two players on Saturday, saving three championship points en route to a 7-5 4-6 7-6 (9-7) win in over three hours on court.

  The world number one has now won every European clay court tournament at WTA 500 level or higher, including back-to-back triumphs in Rome in 2021 and 2022.

  As she prepares to open her Italian Open campaign against either Caroline Dolehide or a qualifier on Friday, Swiatek is determined to ensure she does not let her level drop.

  Speaking during an appearance on the WTA Insider Podcast, Swiatek said: "I feel like after such a match, I deserve a two-month vacation, but I can't have that so I'll trade it for six tiramisus or something!

  "I can let it go and rest and just forget about it, or I can really take a big lesson from it, so it depends on what is going to happen in the next few weeks in terms of how I analyse it."

  Swiatek's latest win – her seventh in 10 meetings with Sabalenka – saw her put further distance between herself and the world number two in the WTA rankings.

  However, the four-time grand slam champion knows she cannot afford to let up, given the fierce competition on the WTA tour.

  "I'm not thinking about Aryna when I'm practising, but it's more that I know that the competition is big and if I stop for a while I might be pushed out," Swiatek said.

  "But I had this kind of thing in Rome 2022, with the final against Ons [Jabeur]. Physically, I was so tired. The rallies were long, Ons was playing a pretty tricky game. 

  "So after that game for the next few years, when I was doing the worst practices on court and I was dying, I was thinking about that game."

• MLB: Ohtani homers again in Dodgers' win

  Shohei Ohtani's major league-leading 11th home run of the season helped make Walker Buehler's return to the mound a winning one for the Los Angeles Dodgers, who posted a 6-3 victory over the Miami Marlins on Monday.

  The Dodgers homered four times in all to take the opener of this three-game series and extend their winning streak to five games. Ohtani and James Outman delivered two-run blasts, while Freddie Freeman and Teoscar Hernandez had solo shots for the reigning National League West champions.

  Making his first MLB start since June 2022 after recovering from the second Tommy John surgery of his career, Buehler did not factor in the decision while allowing three runs on six hits with four strikeouts in four innings.

  Buehler's return began in a rocky way, as Jazz Chisholm Jr. opened the game with a single before stealing second and scoring on Bryan De La Cruz's base hit. De La Cruz later scored on Jesus Sanchez's single for a 2-0 Miami lead.

  The Dodgers quickly pulled even, as Ohtani followed a lead-off walk to Mookie Betts in the bottom of the first with his fourth homer in three games. Two pitches later, Freeman connected off Miami starter Roddery Munoz to put Los Angeles in front.

  Nick Gordon's solo homer off Buehler in the second tied the score once again, but Outman sent Los Angeles back ahead in the bottom of the inning with his blast to center that followed a walk to Gavin Lux.

  Hernandez's ninth homer of the season increased the lead to 6-3 in the third, and relievers Ryan Yarbrough, Blake Treinen and Alex Vesia combined for five scoreless innings to protect Los Angeles' advantage.

  Chisholm and Sanchez each had two hits for the Marlins. Munoz allowed all six Los Angeles runs in 4 2/3 innings of work.

  Wheeler, Harper help scorching Phillies finish sweep of Giants

  Zack Wheeler struck out 11 over seven innings, Bryce Harper belted a three-run homer for a second consecutive game, and the torrid Philadelphia Phillies completed a four-game sweep of the San Francisco Giants with a 6-1 victory.

  Wheeler allowed one unearned run and four hits in a dominant effort that gave Philadelphia its sixth straight win and 10th in a row at home. The Phillies have now won 10 of their last 11 overall and improved to 17-3 since April 15.

  The Phillies did have one streak end, however, as Alec Bohm went 0 for 4 to end a run of 18 straight games with at least one hit.

  Giants starter Mason Black, making his major league debut, kept the Phillies off the board until the rookie issued back-to-back walks in the fourth inning and gave up a run-scoring single to Whit Merrifield.

  Black ran into greater trouble in the fifth, as Kyle Schwarber and J.T. Realmuto began Philadelphia's half of the inning with singles before Harper launched a pitch into the left field seats for a 4-0 lead.

  The Giants got their only run in the sixth when Thairo Estrada reached on an error, moved to third on LaMonte Wade Jr.'s single and scored on Wilmer Flores's sacrifice fly.

  Schwarber capped the scoring with a solo homer off reliever Tyler Rogers in the eighth.

  Black lasted 4 1/3 innings and permitted five runs on eight hits while walking three. 

  Twins bounce back, win series opener against Mariners

  Simeon Woods Richardson allowed just one hit over six scoreless innings for the Minnesota Twins, who scored twice in the seventh inning to earn a 3-1 win over the Seattle Mariners to open a four-game series.

  Carlos Correa went 2 for 4 with an RBI double to help Minnesota get back on track following Sunday's 9-2 loss to the Boston Red Sox, which ended the Twins' 12-game winning streak.

  Seattle's Luis Castillo held the Twins to one run through six innings, but was touched for two in the seventh as Minnesota broke a 1-1 tie.

  Castillo walked Max Kepler to start the Twins' half of the inning and Correa followed with his second double of the night to put two on. Correa advanced to third on a fielder's choice grounder as Kepler was thrown out at the plate, then scored the go-ahead run on a sacrifice fly from Christian Vasquez.

  Manuel Margot then greeted reliever Trent Thornton with a run-scoring single that extended the lead to 3-1.

  Woods Richardson recorded a career-high eight strikeouts while yielding just a third-inning single to Mitch Garver and a walk to Cal Raleigh in the fifth. The right-hander exited with a 1-0 lead, but reliever Griffin Jax surrendered two hits and a walk in the seventh before Garver got Seattle on the board with a sac fly that plated former Twin Jorge Polanco.

  The Twins had gone ahead in the fifth on back-to-back doubles from Kepler and Correa, the first hits Castillo surrendered during the game.

  Castillo allowed just three hits overall in 6 2/3 innings, but did walk three and was charged with three runs - two earned - to take the loss.