Ceddanne Rafaela’s defense on center stage again in Oakland

Ceddanne Rafaela and his defense were on center stage again for the Red Sox in Oakland. And it's nights like last night that can make you realize how much the Red Sox have changed.

And how poorly they were constructed in the past.

In a 5-4 win over the Oakland A's that was harder than it should have been, Rafaela's catch with one out in the 11th inning last night helped preserve the outcome and improve the Sox to 4-2 on the young season. The A's had the ghost runner on second base when Shea Langeliers belted a ball to right center that Rafaela ran down for the second out, preventing a game-tying double (at least) and stopping the A's from placing the game-winning run on the bases.

You can see the catch here:

Now, a few things here: first, by major league standards, this is not an otherworldly catch. It's a good play, certainly, but it's also the kind of play that most any capable major league center fielder would make. So why are we emphasizing it? Because the Red Sox of the last two years would not have made it, which isn't so much an indictment on the players as it is an indictment of the way the Sox were built. While Sox players raved about Rafaela's play, manager Alex Cora had a different perspective.

“From my end, I knew he had it the whole time,” Cora said after the game.

Added veteran shortstop Trevor Story: “To be honest, I was pretty comfy about it just because I know he’s out there. And he ran it down like he always does. That’s the type of player he is. He’s a game-changer. He saved the game for us right there.”

Still let's be clear here. Rafaela's speed is one thing. But Rafaela has innate ability to play defense, and his ability to read the ball off the bat and get good jumps also factors in mightily. Jarren Duran played center field earlier last night probably would have failed to make the play because he lacks Rafaela's instincts. And if that feels like criticism of Duran, it isn't. It's really a criticism of the way Chaim Bloom built the Sox over a two-year span without any apparent concern for how the Sox played afield.

Let's remember that the during the bulk of Bloom's tenure, from 2020-23, the Sox made the most errors in baseball. They played people like Franchy Cordero and Christian Arroyo in the outfield and operated without a bona fide first baseman for multiple years. At times, they operated with more designated hitters that true positional players and looked like a beer league softball team. Lest anyone think otherwise, they're still not perfect. (Second base continues to bear watching.)

That said, Rafaela last night shuffled between center field and second base to fill whatever needs manager Alex Cora had. In using his entire positional roster and all but three of his available pitchers, Cora employed 23 men from his roster. In the process, he lost his designated hitter. But he kept mixing and matching his roster in a way that hasn't been noticeable for some time. Is that because of the roster? Or is that because because Cora, like his team, lapsed into a malaise under Bloom? The manager, after all, is in a contract year.

In the end, as is often the case, the truth is probably some mixture of multiple ingredients.

But the Red Sox look like a more focused, competitive and confident team than they have in years. In a 162-game season, that's a good part of the battle.

In review, the Red Sox opening weekend against the Mariners was hardly a disaster. Could it have been better? Sure. It could have also been worse.

A lot worse.

In the end, halving a four-game series on the road against a borderline playoff team is totally acceptable, but that doesn't make it desirable. After Sunday's victory to earn a split of the four games in Seattle, Red Sox manager Alex Cora said the Sox "didn't get what we came here for," which is easy to say after the fact. Something still suggests that Cora would have taken a 2-2 split against a Seattle team that led the American League in pitching a year ago, particularly with a starting five for Boston that is unaccomplished, unproven, unpredictable or all of the above.

"Like I've been saying all along, I do believe we're going to pitch," Cora told reporters after Sunday's 5-1 win. Added the manager when asked to offer his overview of the series: "We'll take it."

So should you.

Before we get to some of the specific highlights and lowlights, there are a few things to consider as the Sox prepare for a three-game series at the doormat Oakland A's early this week before three more over the coming weekend against a Los Angeles Angeles outfit devoid of both Shohei Ohtani and any real hope. Splitting those six games games would be a bad sign, particularly if the Angels (12th) and A's (15th) have the same punching bag pitching staffs they did a year ago. (Again, the Angels have since lost Ohtani, who isn't pitching this year for the Los Angeles Dodgers, either, since undergoing elbow surgery.) And before you scoff at that idea, remember that the Sox scored only 14 runs in the Seattle series and posted a .642 team OPS that ranked 20th in MLB entering Sunday night.

Of course, the Sox did play two games without Rafael Devers, who had shoulder soreness, though that, too, should give you pause.

What happens to the Sox if something happens to Devers?

The particulars:

On paper, the performance by Red Sox starters in this series was outstanding: 22 innings, 14 hits, five runs (four earned), one walk and 27 strikeouts. Those last two numbers, in particular, should make you want to run through the Public Garden naked and roll around in even the dormant grass like a new puppy.

However ... as was pointed out during yesterday's NESN broadcast, the Sox threw a truckload of off-speed offerings, which  included enough sweepers, cutters, curveballs, sliders and changeups to have you seeing strobe lights. According to baseballsavant.com, of the 343 pitches thrown by Sox starters in the series, only 113 (or 32.9 percent) were fastballs of the two- or four-seam variety. That feels like a preposterously low number, and only time will tell whether that approach was specific to Seattle or whether the Sox intend to junk their way to contention all year long. If the latter is true, the obvious fear is that Sox pitchers will torque their arms so much that their arms will twist up like old extension cords by July. We shall see.

Ya, Mazz, why ah you bein so negative? Frankly, because it's way too early to take the cheese. And nobody should reward mediocrity.

As we said, Devers missed two games in this series with shoulder soreness - and the Sox lost both. The team actually got good production from the bottom of the lineup, including Rafaela and Enmanuel Valdez, the latter of whom hit a three-run home run on Sunday that was the decisive blow in the game. Tyler O'Neill also homered on Sunday to give him bookend homers in the series, which shouldn't be overlooked.

Howevah ... Nos. 3 and 4 hitters Story and Casas went 4-for-32 (a .125 average) with 11 strikeouts in the series, which should have you at least half-concerned. Casas, of course, is still a budding major leaguer who had a strong finish last year and has always projected as a middle-of-the-order bat. Story, meanwhile, has never been the kind of guy to bat third in any sort of legitimate lineup unless playing in the rarified air at Colorado, where he owns a .303 average and .603 slugging percentage. The rest of the time - including at Fenway Park - he has batted .237 with a slugging percentage of .428. The good news? The Sox play three games in the lunar atmosphere of Denver in late July. Unfortunately, their other 159 games will be on Planet Earth.

Story factors into this equation, too, because his defense over the weekend was good. In fact, should Story and Rafaela remain healthy and in the lineup, the Sox project to be considerably better up the middle than they were a year ago, as these two plays on Saturday demonstrated:

So what's the problem? Well, the whole weekend wasn't exactly like that.

Now, if you're asking whether the Red Sox have forever rid themselves of shoddy and brainless plays, they haven't. For starters, in the season opener, reliever Joely Rodriguez forgot how many outs there were when he walked off the mound following a strikeout. (There was still an out to go.) Later in the weekend, outfielder Wilyer Abreu had a whale of a time, allowing a ball to go through him in the 10th inning of an eventual loss, then again when he was unaware that the runner held at third base to make sure a hit would fall on the final pitch of the game. (The run may well have scored anyway, but it wasn't a great look.) And then, on Sunday, Abreu was picked off second base with two outs and two on, killing a rally.

Here's the trifecta:

Obviously, no series is going to be perfect. But the Red Sox have a small margin for error this season, which means they have to avoid injury and ineptitude. Striking out with the bases loaded is one thing. Forgetting how many outs there are , careless flubs and boneheaded base running plays are something altogether different.

This might sound like a small and basic thing ... but it isn't. Over the last two years, the Sox often looked slow, unathletic and, to use former manager Joe Morgan's term, "dead-ass." Cora was part of the problem, allowing the team to pout and point the finger at ownership and upper management, though that hardly means he was the problem. (Managers generally don't win or lose championships.) That said, the difference in this this year's model was notable. The Sox ran hard and aggressively, and no one demonstrated that more Rafaela, who plays with the lovable energy of a windup toy.

Watch these two plays and pay particular attention to the left fielder. On the first, Rafaela sees the fielder lollygagging and takes third place as a result. (In the big leagues, it's almost poor etiquette to show up an outfielder like this, which is all the more reason to love Rafaela's aggressiveness.) On the second - hit to almost the same spot - the Mariners are much more aggressive on the retrieval, which means it took Rafaela all of three days to put Seattle on its toes.