Guthrie tallies 1,000th strikeout in solid win

OAKLAND -- Two days after teammate Edinson Volquez recorded his 1,000th career strikeout, Royals right-hander Jeremy Guthrie notched his 1,000th strikeout on Sunday during the Royals' 5-3 win over Oakland.

Guthrie struck out Oakland's Ike Davis in the second inning to reach the milestone.

"It's 1,000 more than I thought I would have had 10 years ago," Guthrie said. "I'm happy to get there and happy to have the endurance to get to that number."

What pleased Guthrie even more was his overall outing, one of his best of the season -- six innings, seven hits, two runs, one walk and a season-high seven strikeouts. It was his most strikeouts since last Aug. 17.

"[Catcher Salvador Perez] mixed it up really well," Guthrie said. "I think the curveball was a pitch we had good success with and the breaking ball in general was a quality pitch today, better than the last couple of outings. That was the key to the seven strikeouts, just keeping them off-balance."

Added manager Ned Yost, "He was really good. I thought the first inning he wasn't very sharp. But from the second inning on he started commanding everything. His velocity on his fastball jumped up three mph. Changed speeds. He was just really good."

Yost was particularly impressed with the job Guthrie did in the sixth after the Royals had erased a 2-0 deficit and grabbed a 3-2 lead.

"After we got the lead, he came out and struck out the side," Yost said. "That was impressive. That was huge to get us to the 'pen with the lead."

Overall, Guthrie was pleased with his results.

"I felt like every inning was good," he said. "The roughest stretch was when I walked Billy [Butler] and threw three straight balls to Ike Davis. But I was able to get out of that and felt pretty comfortable the rest of the way."