Mookie Betts may have provided the play of the game Monday night.
In the fourth inning of the Boston’s eventual 7-4 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field, Avisail Garcia ripped a double down the right-field line. He tried to stretch it into a triple, but Betts tracked down the ball quickly and made a perfect throw to third for the out.
Alex Cora liked what he saw from his outfielder, saying he never has seen a throw from so far away that was “right on the money.”
“It was a good one,” the manager said after the game, as seen on NESN’s Red Sox postgame coverage. “I saw Garcia kind of like, rounding second and he had the ball already. It seemed like the intention was to do that. You could see it. I’ve never seen a throw from that far right on the money. It was a good one.”
Did Cora think Betts had any chance at getting the out?
“I don’t know because Garcia kind of hesitated around first, he wasn’t going full speed and Mookie got to the ball quick,” he said. “It was kind of like Jackie (Bradley Jr.) last year, it was Minnesota I think it was, and you look and you’re like, ‘no way, is he actually thinking this?’ He thought about it and it will be all over the highlights this whole week.”
As for Betts, he ranked it as his best.
“Yeah, that was probably my best throw,” he said on NESN’s Red Sox postgame coverage. “…. Yeah, I didn’t know I could do that.”
Here are some other notes from Monday’s Red Sox-Rays game:
— J.D. Martinez drove in his 100th RBI in the fourth inning, making him just the ninth Red Sox player to drive in at least 100 runs and hit 35 home runs in multiple seasons.
— The Red Sox finished 7-12 against the Rays this season.
“They have a good team,” Cora said on NESN’s Red Sox postgame coverage. “… All the teams that are in the hunt are pretty good. … It’s a complete team. They have a good bullpen, can play solid the whole time.”
— Jhoulys Chacin started the game for the Red Sox and was cruising through the first three innings. He unraveled in the fourth as the Rays put up six runs.
“The first few innings were good,” Cora said. “I don’t know if he hit the wall. He hasn’t been extended. We felt like the stuff was good. We were shooting for four (innings). It just didn’t happen.”
— Heath Hembree, who had been on the injured list since Aug. 2 with elbow inflammation, was activated prior to Monday’s game and pitched the seventh inning.
The right-hander looked strong in his first outing in over a month, tossing a scoreless, hitless frame.
