Small mistakes by Taylor Walls make big difference in Rays' latest loss

BOSTON — As rough as things have been going for the Tampa Bay Rays over the last couple of weeks, they have little margin for error.

Saturday, two plays didn’t work out for them for the slimmest of reasons. And that made a big difference in yet another loss —the 11th in their last 15 games — 1-0 to the red-hot Boston Red Sox.

The Rays, after a six-week, majors-best run of 25-9, left Kansas City June 26 with a 46-35 record and were a half game off the lead in the American League East. They now stand 50-46 and in fourth place, six games out.

Shortstop Taylor Walls was involved in both of Saturday’s key moments.

He didn’t make the play on the bouncing single that scored the Red Sox’s run, then got a late break and was thrown out on a squeeze bunt that foiled the Rays’ best chance to score.

Walls took the blame for both, as the Rays lost for the seventh time (and fifth by one run) on the 10-game road trip that mercifully ends Sunday.

“There were two costly mistakes that I made that I feel like cost us,” Walls said. “And right now, we should be still playing ball.”

Before getting into the blame game, it does need to be pointed out that the struggling Rays also had the misfortune of facing Boston ace Garrett Crochet, whose dominant start was a key factor in the outcome.

The left-hander held the Rays to three singles in delivering the Sox’s first complete game in a 1-0 win at Fenway Park since July 23, 2000 by Pedro Martinez.

“He attacks. He filled up the strike zone. I looked up in the sixth or seventh inning, and he was almost 80% strikes with that type of stuff,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “A really good pitcher that had everything going (Saturday).”

Walls’ frustration over not grabbing Carlos Narvaez’s fourth-inning single was obvious from the way he slapped the ground repeatedly after the ball got by him. The hit scored rookie Roman Anthony, who had doubled with one out off Rays starter Shane Baz, who had a solid start himself.

“I have no idea (what happened). That ball’s got to be caught,” Walls said. “Baz shouldn’t give up a run. Should have been 0-0 the whole way.”

Walls said that — as he often does — he visualized the play happening pretty much the way it did, with Baz throwing a cutter and Narvaez bouncing a ball up the middle.

“I knew it was coming,” Walls said. “Heard cutter (on the PitchCom device), saw it happen, literally 20 seconds before he threw it. Got a great jump on it, knew exactly what hop I was getting.

“I still don’t know if it went under my glove, I overran it, whatever the case may be,” Walls said. “Just missed it. Play that I make 100 out of 100 times, I feel like.”

Baz, noting how dazzling Walls typically is in the field, had no issue with the play.

“It was a hard-hit ball (98 mph), kind of no-man’s land,” Baz said. “I think he’s got some leeway to play, with as many plays as he’s made. It’s a tough play, and it happens. Got to get the strikeout next time.”

Two innings later, Walls again found himself on the wrong side of a play.

At third base with one out after he and Yandy Diaz had singled, Walls said he hesitated ever so briefly when he saw Crochet’s 96.7 fastball to Ha-Seong Kim sail up and in and wasn’t in proper position to score when Kim managed to get down a good bunt.

“Bad baserunning, to be honest,” Walls said. “Saw the ball coming up in and at him. When (Kim) went to kind of lean back, he did a hell of a job to stick with it and get the bunt down, but my momentum kind of stopped to freeze. So, by the time he got the bunt down I kind of had to start going, and that one little split second of stopping my momentum and then having to try to get it back going is the difference of (being) safe by a foot and a half or out.”

Kim, who said he laid down squeeze bunts “once in a while” with the Padres, wasn’t surprised by Cash’s call, given the situation.

“Obviously, we had a fast runner on third and it was a little difficult, but I just thought to myself if I made accurate contact I have a really good chance,” Kim said via interpreter David Lee. “So, I think I was able to do that, but it just didn’t come (out) our way.”

Walls said another contributing factor was his needless concern that if Kim pulled back and didn’t bunt, Narvaez could pick him off.

“To be honest, that’s the element of it in my head that I shouldn’t have had and should have gotten rid of. That slight bit of fear probably caused me to hesitate,” Walls said. “Then, as soon as I saw the pitch was elevated, knowing everything’s going in to (Kim), as I’m trying to read the ball come in, I don’t really know if he’s going to pull back, if he’s going to bunt it.

“You just can’t have that hesitation on a play like that. ... If he back-picks me and I’m out, then I’m out. But you can’t err on the side of being too conservative. And then he gets the bunt down, a great bunt, like he was told to do, and then I’m out at the plate.”

Baz, who pitched into the seventh inning and well, said the Rays could use the upcoming break.

“Everybody’s going to show up (Sunday) and play their butt off, like we always do,” he said. “But yeah, I think it’ll be nice to have a couple days, get everybody healthy, give everybody a couple days off just to recoup, and have a good second half.”

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