KC Royals finally get the Salvador Perez breakout they've been eagerly awaiting

A below .500 start approaching the end of April was certainly not how the Kansas City Royals expected to start the 2025 season. But what also wasn't in the cards was such a poor start from one of their most consistent contributors for over a decade in Salvador Perez.

The Royals' captain has been struggling as much as anybody in baseball during the season's opening month. He entered the first game of Thursday's doubleheader with the Rockies with a very uninspiring .185/.285/.293 slash line with a 47 wRC+.

But it seems all it took was a midweek doubleheader for Kansas City to get the productive Salvador Perez they've known for all these years, as the veteran catcher had a dream day at the dish.

Salvador Perez has long-awaited breakout performance in doubleheader

For more context behind Perez's slow start, he entered the first game on Thursday having not had a mutli-hit game since April 6. In that span between then and before the start of Game 1 (April 7 to 23), he was hitting just .145 with a .453 OPS and 27 wRC+.

All of that changed though in the first inning of Thursday's matinee, as when Salvy seemed at his lowest, he wasted no time putting together a quality at-bat, lacing a double to left field to drive in two. In his next plate appearance, it was the same result (minus the RBIs), and this time he'd even come around to score. He'd end the night going 2-for-4 with a walk, two runs scored and two RBI.

He'd then assume the role of DH in the second game, and it looked pleasantly similar to the show he put on during the afternoon contest. He started by hitting a long double in the second inning - that came just inches shy of being a historic home run to move him up the all-time home run leaderboard for catchers - and would later come around to score the game's first run. Then in the bottom of the fifth, Perez would double yet again, driving home a pair of runs to make it a five-run game.

He'd add a single in the seventh inning to bring his final stat line in Game 2's 6-2 victory to 3-for-4 with two runs scored and two RBI. This means he finished the doubleheader at 5-for-8 with four doubles, while scoring four times, driving in four and adding a walk in for good measure.

Before today's slate, Perez had just five hits in his last 10 games, now with five hits in in his last two games, the Royals may've just gotten their captain back.

It seems like more than a coincidence that right around the time the Royals began to struggle to score runs also happened to be in and around the time that Salvy really started to enter his slump at the plate. So, now that the Royals offense is starting to fire on all cylinders and Salvador Perez is doing the same, perhaps we're finally set to see the contending Royals team we anticipated this group to be entering the season, in the days to come.