The Red Sox are having a rough season but young shortstop Xander Bogaerts is one of their few bright spots this year. The 22-year-old submitted his latest fantastic highlight on Saturday, when he hit an inside-the-park, Little League-style grand slam that was capped off with an excellent elusive slide into home plate.
With the bases loaded in the fourth inning, Bogaerts slapped an extra base hit into the right field corner at Fenway Park. The great piece of hitting cleared the bases and the Phillies committed an error trying to throw out the third runner at home plate. When he noticed the ball had bounced away from Philadelphia catcher Carlos Ruiz at home, Bogaerts took off to score himself.
It looked like Bogaerts would be toast at the plate, as the toss from the pitcher arrived a few steps before Bogaerts did, but some creativity on the shortstop’s part helped him elude Ruiz’s tag and seal the deal on an unofficial inside-the-park grand salami.
In the box score, it only counted as a four-run double for Bogaerts, but the box score sometimes ignores awesome highlights like this.
