McAdam: Better than a hundred games in, Mookie Betts' signature 2019 moment finally arrives

Last year, it could have been any number of nights, because when you win the Most Valuable Player award handily, there are many, many standout performances from which to choose.

But most likely, it was that night at Fenway last July when he blasted a grand slam off J.A. Happ of the Toronto Blue Jays on the 13th pitch of an at-bat. It felt like a battle of wills that he had won, and when he connected, he flashed a mega-watt smile and seemed to revel in the moment.

It was logical to assume that there would be many more nights like that in 2019 for Mookie Betts, and yet, in truth, there have been few.

Call it the burden of higher expectations, or perhaps trying too hard. Betts hasn't had a bad season, but he hasn't had one of those seasons and because of that, there have been few games that he has claimed for his own.

That changed in a big way Friday night.



He homered to start the bottom of the first, his first homer in the leadoff spot this season.

He homered again when he came up in the third, as the Red Sox kept piling on James Paxton.

And when he went deep for a third time, in only the fourth inning, he put the ballpark and the fan base on alert. Stop what you're doing — Mookie's coming up this inning.

It was a chance to see history, and for Betts, it seemed like the stars were finally aligned. He would get two more plate appearances, two more chances to become the 19th player to homer four times in one game.

That he didn't -- he doubled in the sixth, then grounded out to third in the eighth -- in no way represented a failure. As easy as it seemed for him in hitting the first three -- each one clearing the Monster Seats with plenty to spare -- homers don't happen on demand.

It remained a special night: four runs scored, five RBI and 14 total bases.

"It's always cool when he smiles on the field,'' said Alex Cora after the Red Sox had dispatched with the Yankees, 10-5, for the second straight night. "Today was one of those big nights. Hopefully, it's the start of something great here.''

Again, Betts hasn't been a flop this year. He came into the game leading the majors in runs scored and even before he scored four more, was on a pace to finish with 143. He was third in walks and fourth in OBP.

But while those are strong numbers for a leadoff hitter -- a role he assumed again at the end of May -- he's not done the same damage. His OPS was .874, indicative of a pretty good season, but hardly a great one.

And while he's gotten hotter in recent weeks -- .360 with a .922 OPS in the last 22 games -- the team's offensive spike has been largely driven by Xander Bogaerts and Rafael Devers, both far more valuable contributors this year than Betts.

"I just think he hasn't felt good the whole time,'' said Cora. "He's been fighting his mechanics. He's been grinding, to say the least.''

Betts is known as a perfectionist, a player who's seldom satisfied. At times, a hitting coach or a veteran teammate has had to tell him to stop taking swings in the cage, or to refrain from poring over video. Even after a transcendent season like the one he had in 2018, he demands a lot of himself.

Betts has hit into some tough luck, made some loud outs. He's been handcuffed by lefties, too, with his OPS against them roughly half of what it was a year ago: .682 this year; 1.207 last.

He wasn't comfortable hitting second, and even he was returned to the top spot in the batting order, it took some time for him to get re-acclimated.

Betts remains an inscrutable presence at times, either unable or unwilling to reveal much of himself, struggling to explain both his success or struggles.

He told Cora in the dugout Friday he didn't know what had happened to lead to his big night, a point which Cora took as a good sign.

"I'm glad that that's his answer,'' offered Cora, "because last year, he really never thought about anything. He just went out there and performed.''

"It's been a lot of work and things are just starting to kind of show up in the games,'' said Betts. "(There's a) lot of things that go on beyond the scenes. It's been a long year, obviously not the same as last year. But you have to sort of roll with the punches.''

Hitting may be a science, as Ted Williams noted, but it can be a frustratingly inexact science, too. The smallest bit of tinkering, the tiniest adjustments, can spell the difference between a night like Friday, or the sort of ordinary night Betts has experienced too often this season.

But Friday night, Betts conveyed the sense of someone who was tiring of the extra swings, the constant searching, and determined to go back to his original default setting.

"You're not really thinking,'' he said, attempting to describe what it feels like to have a night when you hit the ball out of the ballpark three times in three tries. "You just kind of turn your brain off and just play. That's when everybody's at their best.''