The real question at the end of the day was whether Kansas City Royals All-Star catcher Salvador Perez put more of a beating on baseballs than he personally took behind the plate. Neither was for the faint of heart.
Perez continued the most productive offensive season of his career with his 31st and 32nd home runs of the season to lead a five-homer barrage by his club on Friday afternoon.
Perez came out of the game in the eighth inning and his replacement behind the plate, Cam Gallagher, hit his first homer of the season in his lone at-bat of the day. The season-high five homers paved the way to a 6-2 series-opening win over the Chicago Cubs in front of an announced 31,835 at Wrigley Field.
“Look at that pitch that he hit for the first one, literally almost on the ground,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said of Perez. “There just aren’t many guys in the game that get that kind of extension to pitches outside of the zone.
“I’ll tell you what else he did really well today. He had some very hard balls in the dirt to block. He worked hard behind the plate. Look at the production from our catchers, Gally coming in and hitting a homer too. Just a great day offensively. A special day for a few of these guys.”
The Royals (53-68) have now won four of their last five games in beginning a 10-day road trip.
Left fielder Andrew Benintendi and rookie third baseman Emmanuel Rivera also homered.
Rivera hit his first home run in the majors, which made him the first player in major league history to register his first hit at Fenway Park and first home run at Wrigley Field in the same season.
“It felt like I was a kid, when I was playing baseball when I was a little kid,” Rivera said with assistant strength and conditioning coach Luis Perez translating. “Very unique emotions. It felt very good.”
Royals starting pitcher Brad Keller turned in his second consecutive start with at least six innings pitched and eight strikeouts.
Keller allowed two runs (one earned) on four hits, including a home run, and one walk. He struck out eight. He allowed just one extra-base hit.
“I felt like I really challenged with my fastball today, really felt like it got better as the game went on,” Keller said. “Then I think my slider played pretty well off that. Me and Salvy had a really good game plan going into the game. So I just tried to stick to it and get as deep into the game as possible.”
Perez’s fifth multi-home game of the season set a club single-season record. His 32 homers tie him with Bo Jackson for the ninth-most in a single season in club history.
Perez left the game after having taken a foul ball straight back off of his helmet in the sixth inning. He’d also been hit on the finger by a bat, and he took a ball off the thigh earlier in the game.
“It shows the true grinder that he is,” Keller said. “A lot has got to go on for him to get taken out of the ballgame. He’s going to stay in no matter what.”
Patrick Wisdom’s solo home run to start the second inning gave the Cubs the early edge, 1-0.
Then Keller had to try to pitch around trouble partially created by his defense in the third inning.
Keller gave up a one-out single to opposing pitcher Zach Davies. The next batter, Rafael Ortega, hit a ground ball that first baseman Carlos Santana misplayed for a two-base error.
That miscue put two runners in scoring position with one out. Keller got former Royal Frank Schwindel to hit a grounder to shortstop for the second out. Then Ian Happ singled to right field to drive in both Davies and Ortega, or at least so it appeared.
On the play, right fielder Ryan O’Hearn alertly and quickly threw to first base where Happ had made a turn around the bag. Santana reacted quickly and tagged Happ out for the final out of the inning.
The Royals challenged via video review whether the second runner reached home plate before Santana tagged Happ.
Upon review, umpires ruled the out came before the second run scored and thus made the score 2-0 instead of 3-0.
“(Replay coordinator) Billy Duplissea did a great job of seeing that it was worth taking a chance,” Matheny said. “Usually when there’s a run involved, we’re going to, but he had it. He said if they get the right angles it’s about an inch away, tag on, from where the foot actually hit the plate.
“That was a really nice job by Billy, and that’s a momentum swing. I don’t think most people in the stadium knew what just happened and what they were ruling on.”
Perez’s 31st homer of the season came at the beginning of the next inning and reduced the Royals’ deficit to 2-1.
Rivera hit his first big league homer with one out in the fifth, tying the score 2-2.
Perez’s second homer came in the sixth as did Benintendi’s round-tripper. That gave the Royals a 4-2 advantage.
They added a run in the eighth after Whit Merrifield reached on an infield single, advanced to second on a Nicky Lopez sacrifice bunt, stole third and scored on a Jarrod Dyson RBI bunt single.
Gallagher’s eighth-inning homer closed the scoring.
