Royals 12, Twins 6: Alex Gordon homered, drove in a pair of runs and scored three times as visiting Kansas City steamrolled Minnesota.

Alcides Escobar and Billy Butler had three hits apiece and Nori Aoki matched Escobar with a two-run single during a seven-run second inning as the first-place Royals won for the 12th time in 14 games to open a 1 1/2-game lead in the American League Central. Salvador Perez and Josh Willingham also homered and Jeremy Guthrie (9-10) withstood a 54-minute rain delay to go seven innings, allowing four runs on five hits and striking out seven.

Rookie Kennys Vargas homered among three hits and knocked in three runs and Joe Mauer added a solo shot for the Twins, who will look to salvage a four-game split in Monday's series finale. Tommy Milone (6-4) was battered in his home debut with Minnesota, giving up seven runs - six earned - in a career-low 1 1/3 innings to absorb his first loss since May 3.

Kansas City erased an early 1-0 deficit on Escobar's two-run, bases-loaded single in the second before Aoki followed with one of his own for a 4-1 edge. Second baseman Brian Dozier was charged with an error on Omar Infante's hard-hit grounder that plated two more runs before Butler's RBI single capped the seven-run outburst.

Following the second rain delay - the game started 34 minutes late - Gordon clubbed a two-run, 422-foot homer off reliever Caleb Thielbar in the fifth before Perez went deep and Willingham delivered an RBI double in the seventh for an 11-4 lead. Oswaldo Arcia belted a mammoth two-run shot in the bottom of the eighth for the Twins.

GAME NOTEBOOK: Gordon is 6-for-11 with five runs scored in the series while Butler extended his hitting streak to six games. ... Milone, acquired from Oakland at the trade deadline, went 2 2/3 innings at Pittsburgh last year in the previous shortest start of his career. ... Willingham, in his sixth game with the Royals since he was acquired from Minnesota last week, homered into the third deck in left in the ninth to give him five RBIs in the series.