Kansas City, Mo. ? Shortstop Neifi Perez says he was only joking when he refused to go into Monday night’s game as a late-inning replacement.

Manager Tony Pena says he’s not saying anything about the Monday night incident.

General manager Allard Baird says he’s backing his manager “100 percent.”

But apparently, something did happen in the final innings of the Royals’ 10-6 loss to Chicago when Pena tried to get Perez to go in as a defensive replacement.

“Whatever happens inside my clubhouse, I keep it inside my clubhouse,” Pena said prior to Tuesday night’s game. “When I address this team, it’s closed doors. I don’t have to go public and say anything about any of my players.”

Perez said he was only misunderstood.

“I told him, ‘No, Tony, I’m not going to play shortstop.’ But I was just playing,” Perez said. “When Tony Pena turned around and said, ‘OK, you’re not going to play? That’s fine.’

“When he turned around, I pulled on his shoulder and I told him, ‘You know I’m going to play shortstop because I respect this game. You know I’m going to play shortstop.”‘

Perez has become a favorite target of the few fans who are still showing up to see the Royals, who are on pace to lose a club-record 100 games. Since coming from Colorado in a three-way trade that shipped popular outfielder Jermaine Dye to Oakland, he has played miserably.

While making $4.1 million, he was hitting only .236. When he singled in the sixth inning last week to break up Oakland pitcher Barry Zito’s perfect game, he got booed.

In the final year of his contract and arbitration-eligible, Perez is not expected to be back with the Royals next year. For the past several games, he’s been benched while the Royals take a look at Angel Berroa, who they brought up in the September callup and hope will be their shortstop of the future.

Two players who asked not to be identified said he refused to go in as a defensive replacement.

When asked about it Monday night, Pena shook his head no. On Tuesday, he simply refused to discuss the incident.

He said his authority had not been challenged.

“No, thank God. Thank God,” he said. “I believe every single player has a lot of respect for themselves and they have a lot of respect for me. It’s a two-way street.”

Baird said he’d already met with Pena about the incident.

“There’s more there than meets the story that came out,” said Baird. “I’m very satisfied in the way Tony wants to handle this. I support him 100 percent in the way he wants to handle this. But I will say this when a player comes to the ballpark and puts the Royals uniform on, he’s expected to go out there and play.

“And from the information I’ve gotten, that was the desire of his. But whether the communication broke down or not is neither here nor there. You come to play, period.”

Third baseman Joe Randa agreed the incident should be kept in the family.

“A lot of things happen that the media don’t know about. This situation, the media got a hold of it,” Randa said. “But it’s going to be handled privately. It will be OK, and we’re going to move forward.”