It’s a happy anniversary for Salvador Perez and Kansas City Royals in win over Yankees
The 10th Anniversary is the two-homer anniversary if your name is Salvador Perez.
The Kansas City Royals’ All-Star catcher marked 10 years to the day he made his major-league debut Tuesday night by smacking a pair of home runs as part of a three-hit night during a victory in front of his home crowd.
The Royals scored the final five runs of the night in an 8-4 win over the New York Yankees in front of an announced 18,218 at Kauffman Stadium to even their series and set up a rubber match on Wednesday afternoon. The multi-homer game was the 10th of Perez’s career and his fourth this season.
Perez went 3 for 4 with three RBIs and two runs scored and led the Royals in a 10-hit night. Whit Merrifield had two hits, two runs scored and a stolen base. Michael A. Taylor also had two hits, including a double, and a stolen base.
“It’s something I’m going to never forget,” Perez said. “Thank God for tonight. It was amazing, especially that we won the game. I think that’s the most important. And with that, two homers, base hit, a couple RBIs. It’s amazing. I’m going to never forget this night.”
In the first inning, Perez belted a first-pitch slider from Yankees left-hander Nestor Cortes for a two-run homer. Perez entered the night batting .333 and slugging .684 against left-handed pitchers this season. He’d also hit 13 of his 27 homers entering the night off of southpaws.
His second homer came in the sixth inning after a mosquito flew into his eye in the top half of the inning as he got ready to warm up relief pitcher Josh Staumont.
Royals head trainer Nick Kenney came out and spent several moments trying to remove the object from his eye with home plate umpire Bill Miller looking on. Then Perez just told them both he was ready to play and that he didn’t want to spend all night on a fly in his eye. So he didn’t actually get it out until after the game.
That didn’t stop him from hammering a 1-0 curveball from Cortes for his second homer of the night in the bottom half of the inning. That homer tied the score and started a run of five consecutive runs scored by the Royals to finish the game.
“He’s incredible,” Staumont said of Perez. “Time in, time out, he just knows exactly where to be, what to do, how to make that impact. He’s a Hall of Fame player. I mean, that’s simple enough. It’s crazy seeing a guy like that. He continues throughout his career. It’s undoubted Hall of Fame talent.
“Odd sharing a locker room with him because he is the most humble, most gracious — you’d never assume the type of career he has had with the way he treats every person in the locker room day in and day out.”
Perez reflected on his first game in the majors. He debuted against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field on August 11, 2011. He went 1 for 3 with both his first big-league hit (a single) and his first RBI (on a sacrifice fly) coming against Rays starting pitcher Wade Davis.
“That’s one of my dreams coming true, that day, August 10, 2011,” Perez said. “I think every minor-league player just wants to get called and play in the big leagues one time. Thank God, first for 10 years. Hopefully, I can stay here and play for another 10 more.
“It happened quick, so that’s why I tell people that I don’t think it’s any problem to play for 10 more years because that happened super-quick.”
Less than a year and half after Perez’s debut, the Royals acquired Davis, the anchor of the dominant bullpen they rode to the 2015 World Series championship.
The Royals traded Davis to the Chicago Cubs in exchange for Jorge Soler prior to the 2017 season. This winter, Davis re-signed with the club on a minor-league contract. He pitched a scoreless inning on Tuesday night.
“I tell him he was so easy to hit,” Perez quipped when asked about his first hit coming against Davis. “He remembers that. We were talking a little bit today. I was like, ‘Thank you, Wade.’”
Putting the pressure on
Royals starting pitcher Daniel Lynch allowed three runs, four hits and four walks in 4 2/3 innings. He struck out six. He expressed disappointment postgame about not getting deeper into the game.
The Royals’ bullpen allowed one run in 4 1/3 innings. That run came against Domingo Tapia in the sixth inning.
The Royals aggressive baserunning and use of sacrifice bunts helped force the Yankees into four errors.
In the fifth, the Royals tied the score when Merrifield doubled with two outs, then stole third and scored on a throwing error by Yankees catcher Kyle Higashioka which Merrifield forced by stealing third. The stolen base gave Merrifield an MLB-best 32. He has also stolen 32 consecutive bases without being caught.
Yankees miscues helped the Royals add to their lead in the seventh inning when Michael A. Taylor doubled and scored on a Hanser Alberto sacrifice bunt. That bunt led to a throwing error by Yankees relief pitcher Stephen Ridings that allowed Taylor to come all the way around from second and left Alberto in scoring position at second base.
Alberto then advanced on a Merrifield deep fly ball to center field. Then with one out, Nicky Lopez laid down a safety squeeze bunt that scored Alberto from third base. That made the score 7-4.
The final run the Royals scored came in the eighth inning after Andrew Benintendi reached on a fielding error by first baseman Luke Voit. Benintendi eventually scored on a sacrifice fly by Alberto.
“You can see that you have to have your attention distracted, whether you’re in the dugout trying to control the running game or you’re on the mound or behind the plate, it’s pressure,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “Then, making things happen. … It does create that kind of momentum, and it’s good baseball. I thought today was one of our better ballgames all the way around, being the kind of team that the Kansas City Royals are.”
This story was originally published August 10, 2021 at 10:28 PM.
