The Royals just signed one of the most accomplished players in club history beyond the next presidential election and honestly I’m a little woozy from all the different ways the next few hundred words could go.
Salvador Perez is signed through at least 2025 with a club option for 2026, the biggest contract the Royals have ever signed, worth up to $93.5 million.
It is objectively too much money for a baseball team in Kansas City to give to a big-bodied catcher already in his 30s. It is realistically a deal that was always going to happen because of what the baseball team in Kansas City believes and what the big-bodied catcher already in his 30s feels.
This is a great human story, about a mama’s boy from Venezuela who grew into one of the best catchers of his generation — a six-time All-Star, five-time Gold Glove winner, World Series champion and MVP and first-team All-MLB in 2020.
This is a great baseball story, about a partnership between club and player that transformed both and included the unprecedented act of a modern baseball team essentially ripping up a contract that had become too club friendly.
This is a great Royals story, about a team in baseball’s third-smallest market with a fan base that wants to love the men who wear the uniform but had become accustomed to watching them leave.
By the time this contract is over, Perez has a chance to have played more games than anyone in Royals history other than George Brett, Frank White, Amos Otis and Hal McRae. He will almost certainly have hit more home runs than anyone but Brett. And he will have made more money than them all — $138.8 million in his career if the option is picked up.
Truly: a dozen interesting stories could be told from this incredible accomplishment for Perez.
For our purposes here, we will focus on three.
1. John Sherman stays winning
This deal is more about Sherman than anyone else involved. Because we already knew Sal Perez had accomplished enough that a baseball team would make him wealthy. And we already knew that club officials loved Perez enough that they wanted that team to be the Royals.
What we didn’t know was whether Sherman would agree.
There are legitimate baseball reasons the Royals should not have done this deal, and we will get into them soon.
There are also legitimate business reasons — Sherman’s ownership is 18 months old and still without a full season or even a single game with fans. Even with a new TV contract that boosted revenue, Sherman had at least plausible deniability to say they could not do a deal like this right now.
It is instructive to remember that Perez’s contract is not the biggest the Royals have ever offered. The Royals offered Eric Hosmer more than $100 million, but in that negotiation then-owner David Glass knowingly did not match the front-loaded seven-year deal worth $147 million plus an opt-out that Hosmer signed with the Padres.
Sherman would not even let Perez reach free agency.
We still don’t have enough time for a full understanding of Sherman’s leadership, but what we know is impressive. His track record is of full financial support, trust in his front office, and actions that back up his description of owning a baseball team as a civic responsibility.
“This is a business and a cause,” he said at his introductory press conference.
The Royals will never spend like the Dodgers. But Sherman is making it clear that they also won’t operate with the same limitations as they had in the past.
2. The Royals stay Royals
There are teams that would have offered Perez a lot of money in free agency after this season. He plays with uncommon energy, is one of the position’s premier defenders, and even with missing the entire 2019 season after elbow surgery is fifth in games and fourth in home runs among catchers since 2013.
J.T. Realmuto signed a five-year deal worth $115.5 million with the Phillies. Realmuto is a better hitter and a year younger than Perez, but still. The price of good catchers went up.
So it’s reasonable to believe that some other team would have offered Perez a deal similar to the one he just signed.
But how many would have jumped the line, and done this extension to keep him from becoming a free agent?
The Royals lead with their heart. That’s their essence. Their greatest achievements and biggest mistakes can usually be traced back to that truth.
In an honest moment, Moore will admit that the Royals were in worse shape than he thought when he arrived. And in that honest moment, if you ask for an example the first one he’ll offer is watching fans walk into Kauffman Stadium and seeing more Yankees and Red Sox shirts than Royals — even if the Royals were playing someone else.
Developing those stars has always been exceedingly important to Moore. It’s why he said the “in a small way I feel like we won the World Series” line in 2013 that people skewered him for. It’s why the Royals drafted Bubba Starling in 2011. It’s why they paid and stayed loyal to Alex Gordon for so long.
It’s why the 2015 Royals happened.
Perez has grown up with the Royals. In a lot of ways, the Royals have grown up with him, too. What’s money when you’re in love?
“It’s special that we get a chance to keep you here,” Moore told Perez.
“Thank you for believing in me, Dayton,” Perez said.
3. Perez has now signed the Royals’ best and worst extensions
Perez signed a five-year, $7 million extension in 2012 that was shockingly club friendly in the moment and even worse for Perez as he developed into a championship team’s heartbeat.
In March of 2016, the Royals gave him a five-year, $52.5 million extension that replaced the final few years of that previous deal.
That first contract was far too club friendly, the second was fair value, and this one will soon be seen as an overpayment.
Perez was terrific in 2020 — .333/.353/.633 in winning the Silver Slugger — but that was only 37 games. In his previous five healthy seasons his adjusted OPS was 7 percent lower than league average. He has not had an on-base percentage above .297 in a full season since 2013.
Age is a big deal here, too. Coaches have been privately discussing a future with Perez transitioning away from catcher for years. If a team has the money, it can justify Perez’s new salaries if he’s a catcher. But no matter a team’s finances, it can’t get value from a slow 1B/DH who is a below-average hitter.
Since 2000, only seven primary catchers have more than one season with an OPS+ above league average beyond the age of 31. Only three have done it more than twice. The Royals just committed to paying Perez an average of more than $20 million through age 35, and they can’t even be sure he’ll be their catcher that long.
In other words, this is an investment the Royals are unlikely to get a positive return on when the numbers are run.
It’s also exactly the kind of investment that’s made them them, and if Sherman continues a willingness to spend above his club’s weight class then the financial hit will be diminished and the value Perez brings can be more appreciated.
