Salvador Perez is the latest prospect on his way to Kansas City, with the Royals calling up the 21-year-old catcher from Triple-A in time for tonight’s game and releasing historically awful starter Kyle Davies to make room on the roster.
Bob Dutton of the Kansas City Start reports that Perez “is expected to become the club’s regular catcher upon arrival.”
Whether or not he’s ready to thrive in the majors is another issue, because while Perez’s batting average in 91 games between Double-A and Triple-A is a nice-looking .291 he added just 10 homers and 16 walks for a mediocre .331 on-base percentage and .437 slugging percentage.
Those are solid numbers from a catcher, particularly given how young Perez was relative to the level of competition, but mediocre power and non-existent plate discipline leave him looking like anything but a top prospect and his track record is fairly unimpressive. He makes tons of contact and has hit for solid batting averages, so if Perez can develop some more pop or patience he has a chance to be very good, but for now he’s a question mark in the short and long term.