Royals still looking to upgrade after Deadline

MINNEAPOLIS -- Moving into position as a possible contender in the American League Central had Royals general manager Dayton Moore moving cautiously as he considered trade options prior to Wednesday afternoon's non-waiver Trade Deadline.

"Our players have put us in a position where we have an opportunity to be in a pennant race in the final two months of the season, so we're going to continue to push forward and do everything we can to give our baseball team and our fans something to play for," Moore said.

The Royals shed a five-game losing streak that carried them into the All-Star break and emerged by going 9-2 up to the Trade Deadline, pushing one game over .500 with Tuesday's 7-2 win over the Twins.

"We were never really in the mindset that we were going to detract from especially from how well we played going into the second half," Moore said. "We felt that this is very talented group of baseball players and we wanted to do everything we could to try to enhance this baseball team and give us the best chance to win going forward, so we were looking on a lot of different levels on how to improve this team and we're going to continue to look. There are two months left to the baseball season and there's potentially the opportunity to improve our team. So we're going to continue to evaluate and look for ways to upgrade."

The Royals made one move on Wednesday, acquiring outfielder Justin Maxwell from the Astros for Minor League prospect Kyle Smith.

Kansas City was reportedly looking at adding offense to the second-base position and were linked to the Angels' Howie Kendrick, the White Sox's Gordon Beckham and the Brewers' Rickie Weeks, but nothing developed.