Royals soaring since holding team meeting

KANSAS CITY -- Former Royals manager Bob Boone used to have a saying about team meetings: "Winners win, losers meet."

A players-only team meeting the Royals held after a loss at Chicago, though, seems to have helped turn losers into winners. At the time of that conclave, the Royals had lost seven out of eight games.

After that, they rolled off 13 wins in 16 games plus a five-game winning streak that carried into Saturday night's game against the Giants.

The value of such meetings?

"It just gets you refocused," manager Ned Yost said. "A lot of times, you [the manager] can have meetings and then they have meetings. Just like when a group of guys get together and talk about turning it up, they all sit back and listen."

Apparently, with veteran players speaking up, the rest of the team did listen.

"Anything we do in here, we do for a reason and I think that woke us up," pitcher Danny Duffy said. "We've always been pulling on the same end of the rope but we just needed to realize who we are -- and that's a really good team with a lot of talent and proven talent."

Yost thought perhaps it was "more of a coincidence than anything else" but he knew one thing that had happened since that meeting to account for more victories.

"We're hitting better," Yost said. "There's no difference in their play; they were hustling, they were busting their butts. We're hitting better."