Detroit: Salvador Perez homered and drove in three runs as the Kansas City Royals beat the Detroit Tigers 5-1 in Major League Baseball on Tuesday.

The game was overshadowed by the announcement that Dave Dombrowski was being replaced as Detroit’s general manager by his top assistant, Al Avila. In 14 years with the Tigers, Dombrowski took one of the worst clubs in the game to six post-season appearances, including World Series losses in 2006 and 2012.

Detroit came into the season looking for a fifth straight American League Central division title, but now trail the Royals by 12 1/2 games.

Justin Verlander (1-4) struggled in his ninth start of the season, allowing five runs on 10 hits in seven innings.

In other games, Brian McCann and Chris Young hit three-run homers during a nine-run burst in the seventh inning as the New York Yankees beat Boston 13-3, Anthony DeSclafani struck out a career-high nine batters as Cincinnati topped league-leading St Louis 3-2, and the Chicago Cubs beat Pittsburgh 5-0 for their sixth straight win.

The Yankees were down 2-1 and held to three singles going into the sixth when they suddenly came alive. The AL East leaders wound up scoring in double figures for the fourth time in seven games — they’d gone more than a month without doing it until a 21-5 rout at Texas last week.

Mark Teixeira hit a pair of RBI singles and McCann, Alex Rodriguez, Carlos Beltran and Chase Headley added late doubles as the Yankees won for the 11th time in 15 games.

In Cincinnati, DeSclafani gave up seven hits and two runs in six innings in his second straight impressive start over the Cardinals.

Last Wednesday in St. Louis, DeSclafani (7-7) gave up only three hits in seven innings of a 1-0 win.

Aroldis Chapman fanned two in the ninth — his fastball topping out at 101 mph — for his 23rd save in 24 chances. The left-hander has converted 56 consecutive save opportunities at Great American Ball Park since his last failure in September 2012.

Chicago matched their longest winning streak of the season and moved 11 games over .500 for the first time since the end of the 2008 season.

Jake Arrieta pitched seven strong innings and Anthony Rizzo tied a career high with four hits for the Cubs.

Arrieta (12-6) allowed two singles — Andrew McCutchen in the fourth and Starling Marte in the seventh — while striking out five and walking three. In his last nine starts, Arrieta is 6-1 with a 1.38 ERA.