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KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The Royals had scored just eight runs during a four-game losing streak, and were preparing to face former Cy Young winner Zack Greinke and the power-packed Los Angeles Dodgers. Perfect time to end that slump, eh? Jeremy Guthrie pitched into the eighth inning, Jarrod Dyson drove in two runs off Greinke and the Royals held on to beat the Dodgers 5-3 on Monday night in their first meeting in nine years. "Dont ask me why we had success tonight," Royals manager Ned Yost said drily. Dyson, the Royals No. 9 hitter, went 3 for 3 and stole two bases. Salvador Perez hit a solo home run, and Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar -- two of the players acquired by the Royals in the trade that sent Greinke to Milwaukee in December 2010 -- drove in a run apiece. It was an offensive outburst considering the Royals had lost three of their last four games by 2-1 scores, squandering solid pitching performances by their starting rotation. "There was never any panic," said Guthrie, who gave up two runs and seven hits in 7 2-3 innings to win his third straight start. "We lost a couple of close games. We recognize a couple things go our way we would have won a couple of them." Greg Holland served up a homer to Adrian Gonzalez in the ninth before earning his 22nd save. Hanley Ramirez drove in the other two runs for the Dodgers, who are visiting Kansas City for the first time since they were swept in a three-game set in 2005. In his third start against his former team, Greinke (9-4) was battered for a season-high five runs and 11 hits in 5 2-3 innings. He had allowed two runs over 15 1-3 innings in his previous two starts against the Royals, one with the Brewers and the other with the Los Angeles Angels. "I thought he was OK," Dodgers manager Don Mattingly said. "There were a few balls where you could see where he was trying to go one place and it didnt end up there. I know a couple of those were to Dyson. I think some of the balls were trying to get to a different part of the plate and didnt get there." The Royals pounded Greinke almost from the start, Perez belting the first pitch of the second inning over the wall in left field for a 1-0 lead. Then with two outs, Escobar singled and went to second on a wild pitch before heading home when Dyson dumped a single into left field. Dyson made it 3-0 in the fifth when he scored on Cains single to right. The Royals finally knocked Greinke from the game in the fifth, this time after Perez started the inning with a double. Greinke fought back to get two outs, but Escobar hit a triple into the right-field corner and Dyson tacked on another RBI single to make it 5-0. That hit ended Greinkes night. As he departed the mound, fans showered him with a chorus of boos, clearly recalling how the right-hander once demanded to be traded from their team. "I was pretty rude on the way out. They have every right to be mad at me," Greinke said. "Its been awhile. Its been four years, so its been awhile. Theyve moved on by now and so have I. At least team-wise. The fans might be different." Meanwhile, those same fans were waiting to give Guthrie a standing ovation. The right-hander faced the minimum number of hitters through four innings, needing just four pitches in the second and five in the fourth. Gonzalez and Matt Kemp finally hit consecutive singles to start the fifth, but Guthrie calmly wiggled out of that jam. It wasnt until Miguel Rojas and Justin Turner hit singles and Ramirez one-hopped a double over the outfield wall to make it 5-2 in the eighth that Guthrie finally left the game. Wade Davis finished the inning, and Holland cleaned up the ninth to preserve the win. "Its a funny game. You go against a guy like Zack Greinke whos had so much success this year," Yost said. "We strung some hits together along with some outstanding pitching weve had the last five or six starts, its a big win for us tonight." NOTES: LHP Clayton Kershaw was the NL player of the week after his no-hitter against Colorado. He starts for Los Angeles on Tuesday against Royals LHP Danny Duffy. ... Kemp extended his hitting streak to 11 games. ... Guthrie struck out five without a walk. ... The Dodgers had won seven straight interleague Arquimedes Gamboa Jersey . When a game is in the balance, however, they still have the personnel and the experience to end up with the two points. Manny Trillo Jersey . -- Martin Kaymer never lost sight of opportunity even amid so much evidence of trouble in the closing stretch Sunday at The Players Championship. https://www.cheapphilliesjerseys.us/1537...y-phillies.html. After just two league games in June, Toronto (6-4-1) will go on to play seven in July plus a friendly against Tottenham. Five of those contests are against Eastern Conference opposition, meaning valuable points in the playoff race are on the line. Ranger Suarez Jersey . - Even with a new coach, the Denver Nuggets still love to push the basketball. Elmer Flick Jersey . Coverage on TSN is underway now while action resumes on TSN2 at 7:30pm et/4:30pm pt. TSN GO also offers TSN subscribers bonus online coverage, with live streams of all four venues.There are many pitfalls in youth soccer in our country. Over-invested parents; the pressure to win at too young an age; high-pressure coaches who focus on winning instead of on development; and increased dropout rates because of these and other factors are just some of story lines that we see repeated over and over. Much of this negativity comes because of our collective mindset that the only way for us to measure our childrens progress in soccer is through the scores of their games. How many points their team gets and how many goals our children score have, for too many years, been the metrics by which we gauge their progress. But what if there was a different way to develop soccer players in Canada? What if we could simply teach kids to play better? That is the goal of Willie Cromack, founder of Play Better, an innovative plan to improve sport culture in Canada. The program attempts to shift the mindset of players and parents alike, away from scoreboard success and towards empowering children to discover their potential - both as soccer players and as human beings. Play Better is a grassroots soccer program designed to provide clubs, coaches, parents and players with a clear and accountable pathway through soccer. This includes an LTPD-compliant curriculum, lesson plans complete with desired outcomes, video training sessions, as well as tools for gathering metrics beyond simply the number of goals scored. The reason behind the gathering of those metrics is where the genius lies. Play Better aims to marry a holistic charitable program with the training and development of young soccer players. The program does through by asking teams to do the following: • Choose a cause or charity. For example; the SPCA, the Canadian Cancer Society or your local childrens hospital. • Choose a baseline metric. For example; a recreational team can choose 100 completed passes per game. A more competitive team can choose a larger number, such as 200 completed passes. This is called the team goal or team win. • Have a pre-season meeting wiith parents to explain your objective; for every game in which your team achieves its team win, ask parents (or friends, family members or sponsors) to donate a pre-determined dollar amount to the team cause/charity.dddddddddddd The monetary amount is not important - it can be as little as a loonie per parent/family. • Create a team website, where the kids can tell their story. It gives them a chance to explain, in their own words, how achieving their objective every game will not only help them become better soccer players, but also make a difference in the world. It also allows them to track and promote how much money they have raised for their chosen cause/charity. Team Falcons is a U11 boys gold soccer team in North Vancouver. Click here to see how they have committed to Play Better. I am often asked how we can shift away from the win-at-all-costs mentality that has infected youth soccer in our country. As I have written many times before, it is one of the biggest hurdles we must overcome if we are to create an effective youth development system in Canada. It isnt the players that we need to convince; it is the parents. A program like Play Better might just be the bridge we need to achieve this. As the members of Team Falcons can attest, players participating in Play Better quickly realize that their sporting endeavours have a bigger meaning. It isnt just about winning and losing anymore - it is about helping others. This teaches players to work on their fundamental skills (to complete 100 or 200 passes per games, players have to focus on what they learn in training), but more importantly, it teaches them about helping others, about community investment and about personal growth. What parent doesnt want their child to learn those lessons? If these lessons can be tied into the technical development of young soccer players, then Canadian soccer could be onto something big. *If you or your team is interested in Play Better, you can read more about the program here, or contact Willie Cromack at willie@championsinsport.com ' ' '