Perez homers, Witt Jr. scores 4 times
NEW YORK — Salvador Perez hit his milestone 250th homer and Bobby Witt Jr. scored four times to lead the Kansas City Royals to an 11-7 win over the New York Mets on Saturday.
Perez, who won the 2015 World Series MVP when Kansas City beat the Mets in five games, laced a two-run single in the second before hitting a replay-aided tworun homer in the fourth. He was originally credited with an RBI double when Brandon Nimmo got a piece of the ball as he crashed into the left-center-field wall, but the Royals challenged and a review showed the ball rolled over the orange home-run line.
“Means a lot — super exciting, especially (in) the win,” Perez said. “Hopefully many more.”
Perez is the sixth Venezuela-born player to hit 250 homers as well as the 12th primary catcher in big league history to do so.
“It’s special for us — everybody that gets to witness this, day in and day out, the fans in Kansas City have seen it for 13 years now,” second-year Royals manager Matt Quatraro said. “Just to be here everyday and watch somebody like him, as professional as he is, continue to rack up those accolades is really special.”
The four-run game was the second of the week for Witt, who also scored four times in Thursday’s 13-3 win over the Houston Astros. He just missed scoring a fifth run in the sixth inning Saturday, when Nimmo robbed him of a three-run homer with a leaping catch at the right-center-field wall.
Nick Loftin collected a career-high three RBIs as Kansas City improved to 10-5 — just the seventh time in franchise history the Royals have won at least 10 of their first 15 games.
The Royals have outscored their opponents 8446, which is the secondlargest run differential in team history through 15 games behind the 1977 team (plus-39), which won 102 games and the AL West.
“We’re trying to make it an everyday thing — just showing up to the yard, knowing that we’re supposed to win,” Witt said. “That’s how you’ve got to prepare. You can’t come to the field being skeptical about anything. Just come to the field ready to play ready to win.”
Alec Marsh (2-0) gave up four runs in five innings.
Pete Alonso hit solo homers to left in the third and sixth and finished with three RBIs for the Mets, who were trying to get to .500 for the first time this season. New York trailed 11-4 in the sixth but got the tying run on deck in the ninth, when Francisco Lindor grounded out against James McArthur to strand two.
“Got down a few runs there and continued to put together good at-bats, continued to put pressure, continued to get traffic all the way to the end,” Mets manager Carlos Mendoza said. “Guys battled them pitch to pitch. That’s good to see, obviously.”
The multi-homer game was the 20th for Alonso, leaving him just two shy of Darryl Strawberry’s franchise record.
Sean Manaea (1-1) allowed eight runs (six earned) in 32⁄3 innings. He surrendered just one run over 11 innings in his first two starts.