Boston's defensive struggles spotlighted in loss to Rays

BOSTON -- Earlier this week, Red Sox manager Alex Cora didn’t feel like hiding the truth.

“We’re not a good defensive team right now,” Cora said. “The numbers don’t lie.”

The play that happened on Sunday afternoon at Fenway Park went well beyond numbers. It was just a glaring breakdown of execution, the clear lowlight of a 6-2 loss to the Rays, the last team in MLB you can afford to be sloppy against.

Before getting to the details, here was the frustration Cora felt after a slapped, hit-and-run single through the vacated hole at second base turned into a Little League two-run homer for Tampa Bay.

“I don’t like it, man. I don’t like it,” said Cora. “I've seen that play too many times the last two years. You’ve got to throw the ball to the right base, you’ve got to back up, you cannot become a spectator, right? You’ve got places to go in every play in baseball and they had a great baseball play.”

Give the 42-19 Rays credit for putting the play in motion and executing like the well-oiled machine they are. But the Red Sox didn’t do enough to prevent it from working out better than even Tampa Bay could have expected.

It started with Manuel Margot taking off from first with two outs in the top of the sixth and Yandy Díaz slapping the ball into right field.

As Díaz’s 91.7 mph single chopped into the outfield, right fielder Alex Verdugo picked it up and made a short throw into second baseman Enmanuel Valdez.

“I just needed to get it in. Under those circumstances, I wasn’t going to be able to set my feet and fire a better throw to home and get him,” said Verdugo. “This game, for those that have played, it’s hard, it happens fast here and there, and those guys, they’re aggressive.

“I didn’t see it very well off the bat and it cost us. I went back and looked [at the video] and I was basically standing still. I didn’t see the ball until it came into the outfield, then I realized where it was hit. So, I lost sight of the ball. It was a late jump on my end. Got there and threw it to second. At that point, Margot’s fast, he never stopped running. So, that run was on me.”

In truth, Margot basically was about to put on the brakes as he pulled into third. But Rays third-base coach Brady Williams, sensing the slowly-developing reaction from the Red Sox, feverishly waved Margot home.

“I was surprised that I was being sent,” said Margot. “I knew the ball was hit and it was slow, but I know I was pressing to even get to third. So when he was sending me, it was kind of interesting.”

If only the play could have ended right there for the Red Sox. But it got worse. Valdez’s throw home was way off the mark, to the first-base side of home plate. Margot scored easily. The madness continued as Díaz raced to second and catcher Connor Wong’s throw soared into center field, where nobody was standing.

By the time Verdugo at last retrieved it, his momentum was carrying him backwards and Díaz scored standing up. Suddenly, a 4-2 lead for the Rays was 6-2, and the air came out of Fenway.

What could the Red Sox have done to prevent the indignity of the play?

“Charge it as hard as possible and get into the infield,” said Cora. “The coach sees the play. It’s a gamble, to be honest with you. If you make two good throws, you get him out at the plate and we didn’t do that.”

To Cora, the worst part of the play was seeing the ball roll into center field for so long with none of his defenders in range.

“We threw the ball away to second and we were just watching like the rest of the 35,000 people here,” Cora said.

Verdugo, who has had a strong season defensively, took ownership for a play that went bad from the start.

“Obviously the throw to second, we had no one backing up because [Jarren] Duran was with me in that no-man’s land,” Verdugo said. “For that, we were out of position, really. But it started out with me. I couldn't see the ball. It was a bad read on it, and once I saw it, it was a little bit too late.”