Surprising Royals claiming believers

By David Hettrick Sports Central Columnist

Everyone says that April standings are meaningless. "It's a long season," players and managers scream as their team comes limping out of the gate. "I always start the season slow," says the slugger mired in a 1-41 slump.

For the most part, I agree with these statements, as I'm sure most baseball followers do. However, upon a little further examination, I have come to believe that while a bad start does not count you out (unless you're Detroit), a great start is the best recipe for postseason accolades.

After closely following the surprisingly white-hot Kansas City Royals, I have been bombarded with stats about teams winning from the get-go. Since 1940, only six teams have started the season 16-3 (including this year's NY Yankees and Royals) and four of them went on to play in the World Series. The last team to start 9-0 before KC was the 1990 Cincinnati Reds, who went on to a shocking sweep of the A's in the World Series. In other words, starting as hot as the Royals rarely is a fluke.

"Winning games early in the season for us was huge for our confidence," former Reds reliever Rob Dibble said on ESPN's Baseball Tonight. "We started believing we should win every game. I think that's what happening with the Royals."

Coincidentally, this goes hand in hand with what manager Tony Pena has been preaching to his young Royals all along. Since the very first day of Spring Training, Pena has tried to improve the Royals' confidence and renew their hopes that winning is possible. He handed out t-shirts with phrases like, "Why Not Us?" and "Nothing But the Best" to all the players and told everyone to ignore the constant media reminders that they were expected to lose 100 games for a second-straight season.

Obviously, this has paid off immediately. "Tony Pena doesn't care what other people think of us," catcher Mike Difelice says. "And now, we don't either. We know what our talent is."

While experts are still questioning the talent, I've become a believer. Although their pitching is young, they have shown great poise. And with hitters like Mike Sweeney and Carlos Beltran, the offense will score its fair share of runs. So, while analysts and other teams might continue to overlook the Royals, I admit that I am a Tony Pena believer. But it's not like that will make any difference to KC.

"We don't need any respect," Difelice says again. "The respect will come after game 162." Or, in the Royals' case, the playoffs.

Article courtesy of Sports Central.