Sal Perez is starting to close in on Kansas City Royals’ single-season home run record
All-Star catcher Salvador Perez is having the type of season at the plate that unborn children will hear stories about decades from now.
The only question yet to be answered is how historic this season will end for the Kansas City Royals’ franchise cornerstone. He’s already surpassed his single-season career highs in home runs, RBIs and walks. He’s had one of the most prolific power-hitting seasons of any catcher in major-league history.
Perez crushed his 41st home run of the season on Sunday, a mammoth three-run shot in the first inning of a 6-0 win over the White Sox that landed in the second deck of the right-center field fountains at Kauffman Stadium.
With 26 games remaining, Jorge Soler’s franchise record of 48 home runs in a season seems within reach. Soler set the mark in 2019, the season Perez missed after having Tommy John surgery in March of that year.
So can Perez catch Soler?
“That’s a great question,” Perez said as he leaned back in a chair and looked into a camera broadcasting the Royals’ post-game Zoom video conference Sunday afternoon. “But I don’t have any answers for that. I’m going to try to do my best every day. Whatever happens is going to happen. We’ve got to wait until the last out, the last game of the season and see where I’m going to be.”
For context, Perez entered the Royals’ game on August 20 with 30 home runs. In 16 games since then, he has hit 11 more to reach 41.
“I don’t know,” Perez continued as he considered the possibility of reaching Soler’s record. “Hopefully, I can do it. I think everybody wants to be there, so I’m going to keep doing my best, doing my job. If they leave pitches right down the middle of home plate, I’m going to try to hit a homer. We’re going to see.”
Perez has now hit 50 home runs in his last 162 games (since Aug. 3, 2020), which ties Soler (2019) for the most in a 162-game span in franchise history. Perez has also now hit 22 home runs at Kauffman Stadium, a new franchise record for the most in a single season.
With 20 home runs in 46 games since the All-Star break, Perez leads the majors during that span. He’s five away from matching Soler’s single-season club record of 25 in 2019.
A Sunday swing
Sunday’s homer was his third in less than 24 hours. He hit two homers when the Royals and White Sox played on Saturday night.
By reaching 40 on Saturday night, he became the first catcher since Javy Lopez in 2003 with 40 homers in a season.
Perez is now within four of Johnny Bench’s mark of 45 homers, the most by a player who played at least 75% of his games as a catcher. Bench set that mark in 1970.
Perez’s second home run Saturday came on a pitch clocked at 98.8 mph on the inside corner from White Sox fireballer Michael Kopech. On Sunday afternoon, Perez smashed a 99.3 mph pitch off the outside corner of the plate into the right-center field fountains for a three-run homer in the first inning.
The opposite-field homer went an estimated 448 feet. According to Bally Sports Kansas City’s Dave Holtzman, that made Perez just the fifth player in the Statcast era (since 2015) to hit an opposite-field homer that far.
“Well, most of us could stand in right field with a fungo and not hit it up there,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “It’s just beyond. When it came off the bat, it looked different. He’s — I don’t know how else to say it. I’m sure glad he’s on our side.”
Perez’s 41st homer of the season — his 27th while playing catcher, for those at the Elias Sports Bureau who are adhering to the strictest guidelines for record-keeping — opened the day’s scoring in the bottom of the first inning.
Whit Merrifield drew a leadoff walk, which was followed by a Nicky Lopez double pulled down the right-field line. With the red-hot Perez coming to the plate and no outs, third base coach Vance Wilson held Merrifield at third instead of making an overly aggressive decision to send him home.
Then Perez watched White Sox starting pitcher Dylan Cease throw his first pitch in the opposite batter’s box for ball one. Cease made the mistake of trying to sneak a 99 mph heater off the outside corner past Perez. Cease failed, and Perez deposited that mistake 448 feet away into the fountain beyond right-center field.
“It was early in the game, the first inning,” Perez said. “You wanted to get ahead in the count after he threw me a slider away. Sometimes, the pitchers think they don’t want to get behind in the count, 2-0, because now they’re kind of in trouble.
“I think it was a good pitch. I just put the barrel on it, a pretty good swing, and I hit it out.”
Not done yet
Later on, in the third inning, Perez played a part in the Royals scoring their fourth run even without getting a hit.
With Lopez on first and one out, Perez’s grounder to third looked like a routine play. However, first baseman Gavin Sheets failed to catch the throw from third baseman Yoan Moncada and the ball rolled in the path of Perez as he ran through first base.
Perez inadvertently kicked the ball that had been at his feet. Lopez, hustling the entire way, scored all the way from first base and Perez advanced to second on the play. The error was charged to Sheets — Perez did not get credit for a hit or an RBI on the play, but his foot-to-ball skills added a run to the Royals’ tally.
Perez finished the day having gone 1 for 3 with three RBIs and a run scored. He’s batting .277 now, and he has 102 RBIs, second-most in the majors, to go along with his 41 homers.
This story was originally published September 5, 2021 at 6:54 PM.
