Alex Cora, Triston Casas Explain Red Sox’s Defensive Miscues

The Red Sox did not have a complete game Wednesday, especially in the seventh inning.

Boston lost to the Pittsburgh Pirates, 4-1, at Fenway Park as the offense continued its cold stretch. Reese McGuire potentially could have tied things up in the seventh inning, but his home run ball was ruled foul after video review.

Things unraveled for the Red Sox in the top of the seventh inning as Triston Casas tried to get aggressive and force a double play off a Oneil Cruz grounder with Jason Delay at second base. The shortstop and catcher, respectively, were safe.

The play was followed up with a Bryan Reynolds sacrifice fly. Masataka Yoshida’s throw was not cut off by Rafael Devers, and while Kaleb Ort tried to throw Cruz out at third, the base was left open. Devers rushed back to his bag, but the play resulted in a crash with Cruz.

“We made two bad decisions,” Cora told reporters, as seen on NESN’s postgame coverage. “The one with Triston to third. … And then the throw from Yoshida. First things first, you got to go to your left. It’s a hard throw, keep it on second, go to first, they score one. We limited damage. We made a throw, we have to cut that ball, and obviously, with Raffy being the cut-off guy, no one was at third. You make bad decisions, you get put in a bad spot. That’s what happens.”

Cora stated the Pirates “kicked our butt” in the series sweep, but the manager did not fault Casas for sixth inning safety squeeze executed by Ke’Bryan Hayes. The first baseman detailed his mindset during the seventh-inning play.

“I knew we were down by two. We weren’t in a countdown for outs, exactly,” Casas told reporters, as seen on NESN’s postgame coverage. “I felt like we needed a big play to shift our momentum. Not saying I was trying to get it all back on that one play. I knew man at the plate was the fastest man on the field, and I knew the catcher was running at second base.

“I anticipated a ball to my right, possibly throwing to third to get that out to prevent a guy from getting to third base with less than one out. That was the thought process behind it. It was going to be a tough play, going to my right, and then feeding Ort and beating Cruz to the bag. I thought, just where we were in the game, it’d be a good play to try to take a shot, try to cut him down at third … hopefully get us out of the inning with the next pitch.”

It’s only six games into a 162-game season, so there’s still plenty of time for improvement. But the Red Sox will be motivated to correct their mistakes sooner rather than later when they head out to Detroit to face the Tigers on Thursday.