BOSTON -- Down to his very last strike, with the Boston Red Sox down to their final out in the bottom of the ninth inning on Wednesday night, Mookie Betts laid off back-to-back sliders that narrowly missed clipping the outside corner of the plate.
Talk about a couple of hot takes.
A month ago -- actually, even as recently as two nights ago -- Betts probably would hae swung at either pitch. And in all likelihood, he would have missed them. Or maybe he would have lunged far enough over the plate to pop them up.