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| Not at all what you want to see. |
After Ross Stripling got utterly shelled for five runs in the first, the hope going into the home-half of the inning was that maybe the Blue Jays could put up two or three, and turn it into a wild one, maybe? And sure enough Marcus Semien walks, Bo Bichette doubles, and we're on our way, right? Except Luis Rivera totally blew it at the third base, and put up the "stop" after Semien had already tucked his head and started charging hard around third on a play it looks like he totally could have scored on. Instead, he was completely in no-man's land by the time Rivera's too-late message reached him, and he was picked off trying to get back to third. Semien was quietly but visibly not happy, and he is a super professional dude, so that quiet-yet-visible unhappiness spoke volumes. This is not the first time this year Luis Rivera has drawn attention to his work at third, and I've got to be honest with you, I'm not thrilled about it! What could have been a big inning ended up with a lone run -- Bichette, on Vladdy's subsequent double -- and my hopes were ruined. Buck Martinez and Pat Tabler seemingly found no fault with Rivera's work here, but to me it sure looked faulty, and I just don't see how Marcus Semien, of all people, gets that play that wrong if not for shoddy input from the third base coach. Would any of this have mattered, given the state of the Red Sox bats last night? Almost certainly not! And yet I remained preoccupied with this issue throughout the evening and well into today. Such is the nature of baseball, and -- who could doubt it? -- of baseball feelings.
KS
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