ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Ned Yost scoffed at the idea that the Kansas City Royals were worn out at the end of a long road trip.

“Everybody’s full of life,” the manager said. “We’re in a pennant race, man.”

The Royals are headed home with a two-game lead over Detroit in the AL Central, even after a 3-1 loss Sunday to the Texas Rangers.

“It stings a little bit. You win two out of three here, but you had a chance to sweep,” said Billy Butler, whose ninth homer accounted for the only Royals run. “If it was the other way around, you lose the first one and win the last two, it’s a little bit different mentality. Our goal is to win series. We’ve done that.”

Kansas City began the series with consecutive 6-3 victories, part of 24 wins in the best 30-game stretch in team history. The Royals, who also took three of four at Minnesota before a two-game split at Colorado, play 20 of their next 26 games at home.

“Keep winning series, and we’re going to be OK,” Yost said.

Scott Baker (2-3) went five innings in a spot start to win as a starter for the first time in more than three years. He missed all of 2012 after Tommy John surgery with Minnesota, and made only three starts at the end of last season for the Chicago Cubs.

“It’s still special because of the road that I’ve had to endure as far as injuries,” said Baker, who earned a win in relief in his previous appearance on Aug. 12. “It’s fun, regardless of whether you’re a starter or a reliever.”

Adrian Beltre put Texas ahead to stay with an RBI double in the first. Beltre had his fifth straight mulithit game, including all three games in this series to extend his hitting streak against the Royals to 17 games.

Neftali Feliz worked the ninth for his sixth save in seven chances since reassuming the closer role a month ago after Joakim Soria was traded to Detroit.

Texas had five doubles off Jason Vargas (10-6), including a run-scoring hit for Adam Rosales in the second. Alex Rios had a leadoff double in the third, and scored on a single by Robinson Chirinos.

Chirinos started after catcher Geovany Soto was a late scratch. The Rangers announced during the game that Soto was traded to Oakland for cash.

Vargas (10-6) allowed 11 hits and walked four in his six innings, but gave up only three runs. The left-hander had walked only one in 25 1/3 innings previously this month.

“It was a start that he really had to grind out. He didn’t have any clean innings,” Yost said. “I thought he did a phenomenal job of keeping us in the game, getting us through six innings. Very, very tight strike zone, which doesn’t play to his advantage.”

POP — GOES THE BASEBALL

Baker induced five popups for outs in his first three innings, and one of the hits he gave up was a bloop single. “We mishit some balls,” Butler said. “That’s what he thrives on, basically came right at us with fastball, slider. Induced a lot of popups.”

TRAINER’S ROOM

Royals: 1B Eric Hosmer missed his 22nd game because of the stress fracture in his right hand after getting hit by a pitch July 20. He is scheduled for another X-ray Monday when the Royals get home, and that could clear him to start swinging a bat again.

Rangers: LHP Derek Holland, scratched from his scheduled rehab start Sunday because of a muscle spasm in his back, said he was feeling better. Holland hasn’t pitched in the majors since left knee surgery during the offseason.

UP NEXT

Royals: Kansas City starts a 10-game homestand on what originally was a scheduled day off Monday. James Shields (12-6) pitches for the Royals against the New York Yankees in the makeup of a game postponed June 9 because of rain. They then have three-game series against Minnesota, Cleveland and Texas.

Rangers: Texas plays Monday night at Seattle in the opener of a 10-game trip before the Rangers play 17 of their last 23 games at home. Mikolas (1-5) starts the opener against the Mariners.

ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) One pitch, one run. And then it was smooth sailing for Jeremy Guthrie.

Guthrie gave up a leadoff home run by Shin-Soo Choo, but didn’t allow another run over eight innings as the Kansas City Royals beat the Texas Rangers 6-3 Saturday night for their 24th win in 30 games.

Alex Gordon had two hits, including a first-inning homer for his 15th of the season, and made a diving catch in left field for the AL Central leaders.

Guthrie (10-10) won for the fifth time in six starts. After Choo’s homer, he retired 12 straight and gave up only four more hits. He struck out two, walked one and left after the eighth with a 6-1 lead.

”The mistakes I made, we got fortunate,” Guthrie said. ”Not too many were hit hard. The biggest thing was I was trying to stay aggressive and keep the pitch count as low as I could and try to get deep.”

Royals manager Ned Yost had no quarrel with the pitch that gave Texas an immediate 1-0 lead.

”The first pitch was actually a pretty good pitch,” Yost said. ”It was a fastball that was down. You’re trying to get ahead with the first pitch of the game.”

The Royals broke a 1-all tie by scoring three runs in the fifth inning, capitalizing on the wildness of Nick Tepesch (4-8). He gave up three four-pitch walks and two singles that inning.

Jarrod Dyson drove in three runs, matching a career high, with a bases-loaded walk and a two-run single for the Royals.

Aaron Crow worked the ninth for Kansas City, allowing two runs.

Tepesch allowed six runs on seven hits and three walks in 6 1-3 innings. With the bases loaded in the fifth, he walked Dyson and allowed a two-run single to Omar Infante on an 0-2 pitch.

”I felt like I was little all over the place all night,” Tepesch said. ”I think that inning was just the worst of it.”

Dyson chased Tepesch in the seventh with the two-run single on which Lorenzo Cain slid in with the second run. The safe call was confirmed by video replay following a challenge by Texas manager Ron Washington.

”The more you win, the more you believe,” Dyson said. ”It’s like routine to you. So that’s probably why we’re going so good right now.”

HIGH PRAISE

Yost, a former major league catcher, said he thinks Salvador Perez, his two-time All-Star backstop, will be as good as Ivan ”Pudge” Rodriguez, the former 14-time All-Star.

”That’s just my opinion,” Yost said, ”though it’s a bit of an expert opinion.”

GOT IT

Billy Butler, normally the Royals’ DH and now their first baseman with Eric Hosmer sidelined, caught a high popup in the second inning and doffed his cap toward the Kansas City dugout. On Friday night, a similar ball eluded him but landed foul.

”When Billy caught it, he was quite relieved,” Yost said, ”and he knew that his dugout-mates were equally as relieved.”

TRAINER’S ROOM

Royals: Hosmer, out with a stress fracture on his right hand since Aug. 2, is expected to undergo another X-ray on Monday after the team returns home.

Rangers: LHP Derek Holland was scratched from a scheduled rehab start for Triple-A Round Rock on Sunday after experiencing back spasms Friday.

UP NEXT

Texas RHP Scott Baker (1-3) will make his fifth spot start of the season on Sunday in the regular spot of  Yu Darvish, out since Aug. 9 with elbow inflammation. Baker has pitched only 7 2-3 innings since the All-Star break. He’ll oppose LHP Jason Vargas (10-5), whose road ERA of 2.07 is fifth-lowest in the AL.

By TRACY RINGOLSBY
MLB.com

DENVER — It’s been 29 years since the Royals last enjoyed baseball’s postseason.

No sense getting in a hurry right now.

Manager Ned Yost certainly isn’t. He is enjoying what has happened in the past month, but he knows better than to start thinking about what could transpire in the next month.

“I am extremely happy with where we are,” Yost said.

He should be.

The Royals fell 5-2 to the Rockies at Coors Field on Wednesday night, but they have still won 22 of their past 28 games. And they are still sitting atop the American League Central. They are just a game in front of the Tigers, but just a month ago, they were in third place, eight games back of the Tigers.

The Royals also are two games up on the Mariners, who are mixed up with the top two AL Central teams in a battle for the second AL Wild Card.

On paper, it would seem that Kansas City has an edge in claiming at least one of the postseason spots.

“I don’t think too much farther than our next game,” said Yost. “Anybody can [beat] you at any time. You better stay focused on the task at hand.”

OK, so for Yost, all that matters is that after taking Thursday off, the Royals play three games in Texas against the Rangers. Right now, the Rangers and the Rockies share the distinction of the worst records in the big leagues. They are both 49-77, and, well, Colorado did just knock off Kansas City thanks to a Matt McBride grand slam.

But what fun is the anticipation of a mad dash to the postseason without taking a peek at where the primary contenders for the October opportunities stand?

And from afar, the early edge goes to the Royals. They have a slight edge in the schedule, both in terms of opposition and the home/road breakdown, and their roster seems to be in better shape in terms of injuries.

The schedule

After the three-game visit to Texas this weekend, Kansas City plays 20 of its next 26 games at home before a season-ending road trip that includes three games with Cleveland and four with the Chicago White Sox. The Royals have 20 of their final 36 games against teams with losing records, and the only serious contender they have left to face is the Tigers, who they play three times at home and three times in Detroit. The Tigers did win the first five games the two teams played this season, but they have split the past eight.

Detroit not only has 19 games remaining at home and 19 on the road, but it has makeup doubleheaders on the road the next two Saturdays, at Minnesota this weekend and at Chicago against the White Sox on Aug. 30. The Tigers have 19 games remaining against teams with winning records, and in addition to the home-and-away series with the Royals, they also host the Giants for three games Sept. 5-7.

The Mariners, meanwhile, play 21 of their remaining 36 games on the road, and before they close the regular season by hosting the Angels in a three-game series at Safeco Field, they have an 11-game road trip that takes them from Seattle to Anaheim (four games) to Houston (three games) and to Toronto (four games). The Mariners have 20 games against teams with winning records, including home-and-away three-game series against the A’s, three games at home with the Nationals, and seven games remaining with the Halos — four in Anaheim and the three in Seattle.

The roster

The Tigers have reason for concern. Fingers are crossed that right-hander Justin Verlander not only will benefit from a 12-day layoff because of a cranky right shoulder and return to the rotation in one of Saturday’s two games against the Twins, but also that he can snap out of a season-long funk that has him 10-11 with a 4.76 ERA.

Verlander did play catch on Tuesday, threw long toss on Wednesday and will have a limited bullpen session on Thursday before an official decision is made, but he doesn’t leave much doubt in telling the media during Detroit’s current visit to Tropicana Field to face the Rays, “We need to make the playoffs. We need to get back in that routine, the starting routine. So I’m going to be out there.”

Unfortunately for the Tigers, there is less certainly about reliever Joakim Soria (left oblique) andAnibal Sanchez (right pectoral), both of whom can only hope they will return by the start of September. Their time on the disabled list, along with the 12-day stretch between starts for Verlander has had Detroit mixing and matching, including signing and then calling up former Baltimore bullpen ace Jim Johnson, who was released by Oakland last month.

To fill recent rotation voids, they brought Robbie Ray up from Triple-A Toledo to start twice in place of Verlander. And to fill in for Sanchez, they brought up Buck Farmer, who has made 18 of his 21 Minor League appearances this season at low Class A West Michigan.

While the Royals were forced to move designated hitter Billy Butler to first base because Eric Hosmer suffered a broken hand, general manager Dayton Moore did find needed lineup protection with the July additions of Raul Ibanez and Josh Willingham, who will platoon in the DH role. The added bonus is that Butler, in a four-month funk, has returned to a middle-of-the-lineup force due, he said, in part to the fact that playing in the field doesn’t allow him the time to dwell on his offensive struggles.

Mariners rotation ace Felix Hernandez did have his streak of 17 consecutive starts of at least seven innings and with no more than two runs snapped Saturday at Detroit, taking a line drive off his hip, but all indications are he will make his scheduled start at Boston on Friday. Seattle also addressed concerns about a lineup filled with too many left-handed hitters with the July additions of center fielder Austin Jackson, outfield swingman Chris Denorfia and switch-hitting DH Kendrys Morales.

Of late

Kansas City is the hottest team in baseball. The Royals have won 22 of 28 games thanks to an offense that has taken pressure off a pitching staff that has been among the game’s elite. The Mariners are 17-13 since the All-Star break — winning 15 of their past 23. The Tigers, meanwhile, are 15-18 since the All-Star break and have scored two or fewer runs in 12 games.

Postseason spots aren’t won on paper. They are won on the field.

And Yost knows that.

“It comes down to doing our job at hand,” he said.

Lately, the Royals have been able to handle that challenge.