Wild throw, baserunning gaffes costly

ST. PETERSBURG — Mistakes were plentiful for the Rays on Tuesday night, and those miscues proved to be the difference in a 2-1 loss to the first-place Red Sox.

“Tight ballgames, we always talk about tight ballgames, and the separator is how you limit mistakes,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “We made just a couple of mistakes today that seemed to cost us.”

The first of those came in the third when Mookie Betts singled to right with two outs. Steven Souza Jr. grabbed the ball and threw wildly to third base to try to nab David Ortiz, who was trying to go first to third. The ball sailed into Boston’s dugout and Ortiz trotted home with what turned out to be the game-winning run.

Souza noted that Ortiz served as the bait for him to make a throw he might otherwise have not made.

“Playing it in my head as the play was going, I knew the ball wasn’t hit very hard, but I knew David Ortiz wasn’t a very good runner and I thought I could sneak one in there,” Souza said.

Souza was his biggest critic regarding his throw, of which the aftermath was a 2-0 Red Sox lead.

“It was a bad throw,” Souza said. “It wasn’t near the base. [Rays third baseman Evan Longoria] tried to make a play to save me and it ended up costing us a big run …

continue reading in source mlb.mlb.com