Bethancourt's 'weird' clutch HR amazes and amuses

ST. PETERSBURG -- As Christian Bethancourt’s fly ball sailed toward the left-field corner at Tropicana Field, falling toward the foul pole and barely clearing the cut-out portion of the outfield wall, seemingly everybody had a different view of it.

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In the Rays’ dugout, manager Kevin Cash thought it was a home run -- but he wasn’t sure. Infielder Yu Chang thought it was a foul ball. According to starter Luis Patiño, “No one thought it was going to go out.” Bethancourt figured it would be foul or caught by Orioles left fielder Anthony Santander, then wondered if Santander had knocked it out of the park. When it was initially called foul, he stopped his trot and headed back to the plate.

In the replay room, Rays staffer Randell Kanemaru saw it had snuck just inside the left-field foul pole and immediately called the home dugout. Cash bounded out of the dugout to ask for a crew chief review. Shortly afterward, Bethancourt was awarded the strangest home run of his career, a pinch-hit two-run blast that turned out to be the decisive blow in a four-run sixth inning that led the Rays to a 5-4 win over the Orioles on Friday night.

“I was a little confused, and then I saw everybody in the dugout celebrating,” Bethancourt said. “So I was like, ‘OK, then I got a homer. That's nice.’”

Tracked at 318 feet, according to Statcast, Bethancourt’s home run off lefty Cionel Pérez was the shortest over-the-fence blast in the Majors this season. It was the second-shortest over-the-wall homer since the start of last season, topped only by a 315-footer the Astros’ Yuli Gurriel hit off the Pesky Pole at Fenway Park last June. It was also just the second pinch-hit homer of Bethancourt’s career, the first since he was playing for the Padres at Petco Park on May 20, 2016.

As Orioles manager Brandon Hyde put it after the Rays snapped his club’s 10-game winning streak, “That home run was kind of a weird one.” But Bethancourt hardly cared how far it went, considering it counted just the same. And it was his first big moment with the Rays since being acquired in a trade with the A’s last Saturday.

“If it happens 10 more times,” Bethancourt said, “I’ll be happy.”

The Rays might say the same for the swings that sent them past the streaking Orioles to their fifth straight win, pushing them back to 10 games over .500 at 50-40. Three of the biggest hits came from Chang and Bethancourt, who had combined to play seven games for the Rays entering the night.

“Hopefully they look at it as a welcoming environment, and they can come in and play a big role,” Cash said.

The Rays didn’t get much going against Orioles starter Tyler Wells through five innings. Down 2-0 after the Orioles clubbed a pair of solo homers off Patiño, who worked 3 1/3 innings in his first Major League action since April 11, Tampa Bay scratched across a run in the fourth on a 105.9 mph RBI double by Chang.

But the Rays finally found their swings with two outs in the sixth. Rookie outfielder Josh Lowe started things off with a 101.5 mph double off Wells before Chang smoked another RBI double to left, his third hard-hit ball of the night, to tie the game and chase Wells.

Chang, who made his Rays debut the same day they acquired Bethancourt, is now 6-for-16 with his new club. The versatile infielder, speaking through interpreter Patrick Chu, credited hitting coach Chad Mottola for suggesting an adjustment that made him feel more stable in the batter’s box, and it seems to be working out.

“Yu Chang has really swung the bat well since we've seen him come over,” Cash said. “We've seen some aggressiveness out of him, some intent, and he's really driving the ball.”

The Rays’ big inning continued against Pérez, who hadn’t allowed an earned run since June 14, as Francisco Mejía smacked a go-ahead double to left. Up came Bethancourt, who had grown accustomed to being ready to enter a game at any time after playing with the A’s. He’d already taken a few rounds of practice in the batting cage, preparing for a possible pinch-hit appearance against the left-handed reliever.

Then he came through with the swing the Rays needed, even if it wasn’t clear to everyone right away.

“The guys don't quit. They never give up,” Bethancourt said. “You can be silent for five innings, and then there's one inning where they're going to put four or five, six at-bats together and get something going. We saw it happen.”