Salvador Perez doesn’t want to make a stink.
The All-Star catcher for the Kansas City Royals wore Victoria’s Secret perfume late in the 2013 season after teammate Alcides Escobar sprayed it on him, then had a four-hit game.
“We won. We celebrated. I asked him, ‘Where did you buy that?’” Perez said this week at the World Series. “I need to buy some, maybe to wear for the rest of my life.”
He stuck with the smell of success and switched this year to 212 Men by Carolina Herrera cologne. Escobar buys it for him, and Perez has gone through three bottles.
“The weirder the team, the better the team, usually,” Royals outfielder Raul Ibanez said. “We’ve got a lot of weird stuff that goes on in here.”
Perez said San Francisco’s Pablo Sandoval, Detroit’s Victor Martinez and Texas’ Prince Fielder are among the players who have remarked about his cologne. Detroit’s Miguel Cabrera asked where he could get some for himself.
Umpires also have taken notice.
“I think Jerry Meals told me: ‘Salvy, you smell good,’” Perez said. “We sweat. We’ve got the gear. We stink.”
The strange scent of Perez and Escobar has become part of Kansas City’s identity.
“I know they’re sweet smelling on the bench, that’s for sure,” Royals Manager Ned Yost said. “That’s one of the more unusual ones. But it’s been effective, so it works for them.”
Still, not everyone has taken notice of the olfactory addition to the diamond.
“I don’t go around smelling catchers’ armpits,” senior umpire Joe West said before breaking into laughter.
Day’s thoughts
Little Rock’s Glen Day was inducted into the Arkansas State Golf Association’s Hall of Fame on Thursday.
Although he has never played in a Ryder Cup, he offered some thoughts on the U.S. team’s recent 16 1/2-11 1/2 loss at the Ryder Cup.
“I don’t think you do anything different,” Day said of any possible changes by the U.S. team before the 2016 Cup. “Obviously I haven’t been in the locker rooms of a Ryder Cup, but I’ve read some comments of Mr. [Jack] Nicklaus, and I think he has been in a few of those locker rooms.
“The bottom line is when you get beat there’s nothing you can do, and they got beat. Justin Rose and his partner[Henrik Stenson] won a match in a best ball 3 and 2 and the U.S. team [Bubba Watson and Matt Kuchar] was 9 under. They were 12 under.
“That’s called getting beat. I don’t care how much strategy you do.”
Home-field advantage?
The Denver Broncos were leading the San Diego Chargers 35-21 on Thursday night with the ball at the two-minute warning of the fourth quarter in a game played at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.
That’s when the PA system started playing House of Pain’s “Jump Around” in the stadium. Even Denver cornerback Aqib Talib got into it and started dancing on the sideline.
When Talib was shown on the stadium’s big screen, the crowd got even more fired up, but quarterback Peyton Manning wasn’t happy about it. The Broncos were flagged for a false-start penalty after the two-minute warning, although it didn’t seem that was due to the crowd noise.
“I’ve got a problem with our scoreboard operator,” Manning said. “I’ve got to have a little talk with him. I’m not sure what he’s doing. Our fans were great, our fans were loud, but the scoreboard operator, it wasn’t his best night.”
QUIZ
Where did Denver cornerback Aqib Talib attend college?
ANSWER
Kansas