Luke Hochevar allowed just one hit over his seven innings, but had to sweat out his second win of the year on a 38 degree night, as the bullpen was shaky down the stretch. The Royals held off a late charge from Seattle to win 6-5.

Blake Wood gave up three hits and a run to cut the lead to 6-2 in the 8th. In the ninth, lefty Tim Collins walked two batters and Ned Yost had to turn to his closer Joakim Soria who had another shaky performance.

Soria got a strikeout, but gave up an RBI single to Michael Saunders, then walked Luis Rodriguez and pinch-hitter Justin Smoak to force in a run. A third run scored on a force out at second, before Chone Figgins lined out to end the game.

Soria was making no excuses about the weather. “There’s no excuses, I never put excuses on myself. It was a very bad outing out there. Thank God we got a win. I got lucky out there. I don’t feel like it was because of the weather I threw like that. It was just a bad outing.” Soria’s ERA is 7.04.

For the first seven innings, it was all Royals. Jeff Francoeur crushed a two run homer that went over 430 feet approaching the Royals Hall of Fame in left field. Both Francoeur and Billy Butler had three hits.

Matt Treanor added a solo homer and Mike Aviles doubled home a run. Alcides Escobar singled to start the sixth, stole second and scored on Butler’s two-out single and that bit of small ball turned out to be what the Royals needed.