KANSAS CITY — The sinker that Jac Caglianone hit in the fourth inning Wednesday night was gone as soon as his bat made contact with it — everyone in the ballpark knew that.
But then it just kept going.
Caglianone’s two-run home run off Pirates starter Bailey Falter cleared not one, not two but three separate walls in center field at Kauffman Stadium for a whopping Statcast-projected 466 feet, bouncing over the QuikTrip banner below the CrownVision scoreboard.
It was Caglianone’s second home run in as many days and helped the Royals to a 4-3 win over the Pirates, clinching a series sweep. But the rookie was not the only Kansas City power hitter to launch a baseball a long way on Wednesday.
Salvador Perez — the Royals’ captain and the hitter whom Caglianone has watched from the on-deck circle for the majority of his month-plus in the big leagues — hit two clutch home runs, one to put Kansas City on the board in the second and the biggest one of the night to break a 3-3 tie in the eighth inning.
By the end of the night, Perez and Caglianone had combined for 1,336 feet worth of home runs, showcasing the power the Royals have wanted to see as the summer heats up.
Caglianone is appearing to heat up a bit this week, too, as he begins to climb his way out of a slow start that had him slashing .148/.203/.261 entering Wednesday night.
Tuesday’s homer was as much of a relief to Caglianone as anyone, happy to just get a barrel on the ball and take a trip around the bases for the first time at The K.
He followed it up Wednesday with the jaw-dropping blast that gave the Royals a three-run lead.
The 466-foot shot was the longest homer by a Royals rookie since Statcast began tracking distances in 2015, and it’s tied for the 10th-longest home run by any player — fourth longest by a Royal — at Kauffman Stadium. It was only eight feet shy of Brandon Moss’ record 474-foot blast in 2017. And it was just three feet shy of the longest homer hit here this year: Aaron Judge’s 469-foot blast on June 10.
