Carter Jensen’s red-hot stretch making it easy for Royals to mask Salvador Perez’s downfall

The Kansas City Royals may still unfortunately sit 14 games under .500 and in a tie for the worst record in the American League, but they haven’t been devoid of bright spots. And while much of the recent hype has surrounded the surge that Jac Caglianone has been on this month, another Royals youngster has been on a tear himself.

Carter Jensen has gone about his business and constructed an incredible 16-game hitting streak. In this span he’s belted four homers, driven 14 runs and hit .344 with a 1.030 OPS and 175 wRC+. And in instances like Thursday’s dreadful loss to the Rays, he’s started to look like the type of name that’s becoming one who could put a lineup on his back, which is representative of the top prospect pedigree he graduated from this season.

As the Royals were staring in the face of being no-hit by Tampa Bay Rays in the ninth inning, Jensen stepped to the plate and unloaded on a Craig Kimbrel’s first pitch to him over the wall in right center field to not only put Kansas City on the board, but spare them the embarrassment of being an addition to the history books for the wrong reasons.

Jensen’s hitting streak continuing not only helps further lift him out of the slump he’d been in since capturing the team’s hitter of the month honors in April – he now sits at a 103 wRC+ for the season – but it also helps further mask the dreadfully poor season his fellow catcher Salvador Perez has been having.

Salvador Perez has been thoroughly outplayed by his rookie catching counterpart

While decline is only natural with age a 36-year-old backstop with 15 years of big league experience like Perez is certainly the profile to experience such decline, it hasn’t been a slight decline, nor a fall from grace, rather a plummet.

While he may’ve been a mildly below-average hitter in 2025 with a 95 wRC+, he was worthy of Silver Slugger recognition with 30 HR and 100 RBI, this season hasn’t come remotely close to matching even those numbers. Through 320 plate appearances this season, Perez is barely managing to stay above the Mendoza line with a .201 AVG and his .576 OPS is the worst amongst qualified hitters in the major leagues.

On top of that, only Ezequiel Tovar of the Colorado Rockies holds a qualified wRC+ lower than Perez’s marks of 53 and his -1.4 fWAR ranks as the lowest qualified mark in baseball by a considerable margin. Simply put, he’s been one of if not the worst regular position players in MLB which is certainly not what the Royals had in mind when they extended him this winter.

Perhaps Jensen’s impressive hitting streak marks the official changing of the guard at catcher for the Royals. Perhaps it’s time for Kansas City to really lean into Perez’s vocal leadership and less on him as a starting catcher. The 22-year-old Jensen is supposed to be a key part of their future after all. Maybe now is the time to embrace it.