Dodger Response Is Ringing : Baseball: After players-only meeting, DeShields hits grand slam during seven-run inning in 10-1 rout of Cardinals.

Dodger players got together Wednesday morning, kicked the coaching staff out of the clubhouse and preached to each other what the baseball world has been saying all along:

They have too much talent, with a slew of players having all-star seasons, to muddle along in mediocrity.

Just to reassure themselves that they have the personnel to run away with the National League West, they went out and blasted the St. Louis Cardinals, 10-1, in their biggest rout of the season before a paid crowd of 26,778 at Busch Stadium.

“You look at this team, and you say, ‘Damn, we should be a first-place team,’ ” said second baseman Delino DeShields, whose grand slam was the big blow in a seven-run second inning. “But look at us. There’s no way we should be at .500 [26-26].

“We should be winning this thing easy with this talent. But half of the time, we just beat ourselves.”

The Dodgers have won 10 of 16 games since catcher Mike Piazza’s return to the lineup, but they still are in last place, two games behind the first-place Colorado Rockies.

“It’s a joke,” closer Todd Worrell said. “We should be killing teams. We have one of the best offenses in the league, a great pitching staff, and we can’t win? Guys on other teams can’t believe it.

“To sit back and worry about individual performances, and then point fingers because we don’t like the way we think someone should be playing, is wrong.

“We’re all guilty, and it was time for us to say, ‘Are we going to let them take these games away from us, or are we going to take it to them?’

“[Manager Tommy] Lasorda and the coaches can’t play the damn game for us. We’ve got to play it ourselves. Guys need to take a hard look at our team and make something happen.”

It’s just what first baseman Eric Karros was trying to make shortstop Jose Offerman understand Tuesday night during their 7-0 loss to the Cardinals. Yet, Offerman didn’t like the constructive criticism. They began yelling at one another in the dugout and had to be separated.

“It was somebody trying to step up to be the team leader,” said starter Tom Candiotti (3-5), who received more run support in the second inning than his last four starts combined. “[Karros] saw something he didn’t think looked right to him, and he let it be known. I thought he did it in a very constructive manner.”

Karros, who declined comment Tuesday night, again chose not to address the incident. But he and Offerman privately shook hands and said all is forgotten.

“All good teams fight because they want to win,” DeShields said, “but the big thing was not to let it take away from the team. It was just something that happened in the heat of the battle, but you don’t want the whole nation to see it.

“If we just keep it in the house, play our game, we’ll be all right.”

The Dodgers unleashed their pent-up frustration against Cardinal starter Vicente Palacios (2-3). Raul Mondesi’s one-out single began the offensive onslaught, sending seven batters to the plate without an out.

Palacios hit Dave Hansen with one pitch, and Billy Ashley with another, loading the bases. Candiotti, who yielded only three hits and one run in seven innings, delivered a two-strike, run-scoring single to center.

Up stepped DeShields. Palacios threw a fastball after falling behind 2-0 in the count. DeShields sent it deep into the right-field seats.

“I told Bop [DeShields] it reminded me of the time he hit that slam off me back in A-ball,” teammate Willie Banks said. Little did Banks realize that it was DeShields’ last grand slam, playing in 1987 for Rockford, Ill.

Chad Fonville, playing shortstop only because Offerman needed a day off, Lasorda said, continued the assault with a single to center. Out came Palacios. In came Rich DeLucia. And out went Piazza’s two-run homer, completing the Dodgers’ biggest inning this season.

“We sure needed that,” said third baseman Dave Hansen, who subbed for Tim Wallach and hit a two-run homer in the third inning and doubled in the eighth. “When you’re playing well, there’s no need to make a U-turn.”

Then again, they were rudely reminded of their deficiencies in in the third inning. They nearly fielded for the cycle when every infielder but Karros made an error.

On a day like this, some things can be overlooked. When you have an emotional 25-minute meeting, revealing some of your innermost thoughts, who can blame the Dodgers for simply wanting to remember the good?

“I still don’t even know what they talked about,” Lasorda said, “but whatever it was, they should do it every day.”