Salvador Perez’s two homers couldn’t keep Kansas City Royals from losing on a walk-off

Right-hander Scott Barlow has been the most reliable reliever in the Kansas City Royals bullpen. He’s been the guy they’ve turned to in the tightest spots this season, and he has delivered more often than not.

However, the Oakland Athletics got a pair of hits against Barlow in the ninth inning and that was enough to push across the one run necessary to deal the Royals a 4-3 loss Friday night in the second game of a four-game series in front of an announced 6,964 at the Oakland Coliseum.

For the second night in a row, the Royals (30-32) did all their scoring in the final three innings as they rallied from a three-run deficit to tie the game.

“It was a great fight, offensively, to get back in there,” Royals manager Mike Matheny said. “Would we want more, yeah, but that’s a lot to pick up late in the game like we did. You just gotta see who capitalized late, and they did.”

Royals catcher Salvador Perez recorded his third two-homer game since the start of June. He now has nine career multi-home run games. Perez went 3 for 4 and registered his fourth game with at least three hits this season.

With the win, the Athletics (38-27) evened the series at a game apiece. They’ve had an MLB-high six walk-off wins this season.

“He did such a nice job in the eighth,” Matheny said of Barlow. “He was so efficient, and he has been our rock and so good. We got to push him right there. He’s going to give us our best chance, so we gave him an opportunity, but he was right about at the end of his rope.”

Barlow, the only pitcher with multiple two-inning saves this season, entered the night with a career-best 12-inning scoreless streak that dated back to May 14.

He worked a scoreless eighth inning and retired the first batter of the ninth on a grounder to first base. With one out, Athletics slugger Matt Chapman hit a 3-2 slider into the left-field corner for his second double of the night.

After the Royals intentionally walked Seth Brown, Elvis Andrus slapped an RBI single to right field for his sixth-career walk-off hit.

Jarrod Dyson, who entered the game for the Royals as a pinch-runner and stayed in for his defensive prowess, made a great throw to the plate to make it a close play.

Andrus had fouled off a curveball and a slider with the count 2-2. Barlow’s third 2-2 pitch, a fastball on the outer half, stayed up just enough for Andrus to drive it into right field.

“Andrus took some pretty good sliders, same with Chapman,” Perez said. “Chapman took some really good pitches. That’s a great at-bat for him. Barlow has one of the best sliders in the game. They don’t hit anything against his slider. We threw some fastballs away. Chapman put some good swings (on it). We threw sliders, strike-to-ball. He took it.

“I think Barlow did a pretty good job. He’s the best pitcher we have, for me. There’s going to be days like that.”

Royals starting pitcher Brady Singer allowed three runs on five hits (one home run) and one walk. He struck out seven and recorded his fifth quality start of the season. All three runs he allowed came in the fourth inning.

Singer gave up back-to-back one-out doubles in the fourth inning. The second of those, an RBI double by Chapman to left field, gave the Athletics a 1-0 lead. The next batter, Brown, hit a 2-2 fastball over the right-field wall for the third consecutive extra-base hit to make the score 3-0.

“I don’t know,” Singer said of the pitches in the fourth. “I thought I threw some really good pitches there. I thought I got them way inside on their hands there. They were able to do something with it.”

Singer has now given up 17 extra-base hits this season (13 starts), and 13 of them have come by left-handed hitters, including all five home runs against Singer.

For the second night in a row, the Royals’ offense jump-started in the seventh inning. This time, Perez’s solo home run to left field got them on the board as they finally got to Athletics starting pitcher Cole Irvin.

Irvin held the Royals scoreless through the first six innings and limited them to three hits. In the seventh, the first three batters — Perez, Andrew Benintendi and Jorge Soler — registered hits before Irvin turned it over to the bullpen.

The Royals tacked on another run with two outs when Andrus, moving to his right from his shortstop position, couldn’t cleanly field a Michael A. Taylor’s grounder.

Then Taylor beat the throw to second base on a fielder’s choice on a grounder by Hanser Alberto to load the bases for Whit Merrifield.

Merrifield’s broken-bat lineout to second base ended the inning with the Royals trailing 3-2.

The Royals were 0 for 10 with runners in scoring position.

Perez’s second home run of the game, against left-handed reliever and former Royal Jake Diekman, tied the score 3-3 with one out in the eighth.

With two outs in the eighth, the Royals’ Hunter Dozier blooped a single into center field with Benintendi on first. Benintendi attempted to score on the play, though he hesitated slightly as he rounded third base. The play at the plate was incredibly close and the original out call was upheld upon review.

Matheny said in subsequent reviews he saw that Benintendi’s hand had gotten to the plate, but it had hovered slightly above the plate when Athletics catcher Aramis Garcia applied the tag.

Kelvin Gutierrez singled to start the top of the ninth inning for the Royals, and Dyson pinch-ran and stole second base. However, Taylor and Alberto struck out swinging and Merrifield’s fly ball to right field ended the inning.