LOS ANGELES — Willy Adames took accountability for a boneheaded base-running mistake that resulted in him being doubled up at second base late in the Giants’ loss to the Dodgers.
“That mistake is probably the most ashamed that I would feel playing the game,” the veteran shortstop said after the 4-0 defeat. “I know that can’t happen. It was my fault. That’s on me.”
Adames knew he had screwed up about the time he touched third base, when the roar of the crowd told him that the fly ball off Drew Gilbert’s bat had been caught on the warning track in left-center field. There was only one out, and Adames didn’t tag up.
Center fielder Andy Pages fired the ball back to cutoff man Mookie Betts, who was able to lob it casually to Miguel Rojas at second base and double up Adames to end the seventh inning. He had made it far enough that he wasn’t even in the camera frame when the throw arrived.
“I honestly thought it was going to be a double,” Adames said.
The $182 million, ninth-year vet confirmed that he made a mental lapse that would be egregious from one of manager Tony Vitello’s former college players, let alone a big leaguer awarded the largest contract in franchise history.
Before the play, Adames was doing what he normally does, chatting up the player nearest him. In this case, it happened to be Betts, the Dodgers’ shortstop. For pretty much the entirety of Gilbert’s at-bat, Adames was yapping it up with Betts and even had his back turned to home plate more than once split-seconds before Shohei Ohtani began his delivery.
He claimed he wasn’t distracted.
“I do that every time,” Adames said. “If it was because of that, I’d make mistakes every two days. It’s just my fault. It’s something that can’t happen. There’s no excuses for it.”
Third base coach Hector Borg was no help: Adames said he didn’t see or hear any direction from the coach’s box to shift into reverse and hustle back to second.
Source: California Post – Breaking California News, Photos & Videos
