The Boston Globe - 13.08.2019

TUESDAY, AUGUST 13, 2019 The Boston Globe Sports D3

AndyMurraymoved well in his first singles
match since January, but not well enough to
move on — even to the US Open.RichardGas-
quet, using a bottomless arsenal of drop shots,
snapped a five-match losing streak against Mur-
ray with a 6-4, 6-4 win in the first round of the
Western & Southern Open on Monday in Ma-
son, Ohio. The singles match was Murray’s first
since a painful exit from the Australian Open
that had him thinking his career might be over.
The 32-year-old three-time Grand Slam cham-
pion underwent a second hip surgery on
Jan. 28, receiving metal implants that helped
eliminate the pain that had hobbled him for a
long time. Murray played doubles in several
tournaments, including Wimbledon withSere-
naWilliamsand at Washington with brotherJa-
mie, before deciding to try singles at Cincinnati,
where he is a two-time champion. The US
Open’s wild-card timing led Murray to decide
against playing in New York.

SOCCER

MarkgraftabbedGMofUSWNT

Former defenderKateMarkgrafwas named
the general manager for the US women’s na-
tional soccer team, according to a person with
knowledge of the hiring. Markgraf appeared in
201 games during a playing career that
spanned 12 years.. .FrancisJacobs, of Laguna
Beach, Calif., became the youngest male player
ever to sign a professional soccer contract in the
United States at 14 years, 4 months, and 29
days old when he signed last month with the
USL Championship club Orange County SC. Ja-
cobs was less than a month younger thanFred-
dyAduwhen he signed an MLS deal with DC
United in 2003... Real Salt Lake fired head
coachMikePetkeon Sunday, two weeks after
he was suspended without pay by the club and
given a suspension and fine by MLS for using
unacceptable and offensive language and re-
peated confrontational misconduct toward
match officials. Real Salt Lake (11-9-4) named
assistant coachFreddJuarezinterim head
coach... With a goal and two assists in Los An-
geles Football Club’s 4-2 victory over the New
York Red Bulls on Sunday,CarlosVelatiedSe-
bastianGiovincofor the most points in an MLS
season. Giovinco had a combined 38 goals and
assists in 2015 with Toronto. Vela has 23 goals

and 15 assists with 10 games remaining in the

MLS regular season.

NHL

Panthersre-signGMWaddell

The Carolina Hurricanes re-signed team

president and general managerDonWaddellto

a multi-year contract extension, team owner

TomDundonannounced. Waddell, 60, had been

mentioned as a candidate for the Wild’s GM va-

cancy... The Panthers will retireRobertoLu-

ongo’sNo. 1 jersey on March 7. The Panthers

announced the ceremony for their now-retired

goaltender, fittingly, in a game against Luongo’s

hometown Montreal Canadiens.

MISCELLANY

Ex-Celticsentenced3½years

Former Boston CelticSebastianTelfairwas

sentenced to 3½ years in prison for illegal gun

possession, Brooklyn’s district attorney an-

nounced. Telfair, 34, who spent time with the

Trail Blazers and Timberwolves, was convicted

in April of second-degree criminal possession of

a weapon, which stemmed from an arrest in

January 2017 when police found firearms in-

cluding a semi-automatic rifle, ammunition, a

ballistic vest, and marijuana inside a vehicle

Telfair was driving during a traffic stop in

Brooklyn... Jewelry and electronics were sto-

len from the rental car of former MLB starAlex

Rodriguezshortly after calling a game between

the Giants and Phillies on ESPN’s ‘‘Sunday

Night Baseball,’’ according to reports... The Di-

amonbacks designated for assignment former

Red Sox catcherBlakeSwihart, who was traded

to Arizona in April... Former Orioles third

basemanDougDeCinceswas spared a prison

term and ordered to serve eight months home

detention and two years of court-supervised

probation after being found guilty of insider

trading and making more than $1 million off a

tip. A federal judge in Santa Ana, Calif., sen-

tenced DeCinces to time served after agreeing

with prosecutors that a day he spent in incar-

ceration was enough for the ex-player who co-

operated with a US investigation... Bri Bri, an

unraced 3-year-old filly trained byJimCassidy,

became the fourth horse to die in training at Del

Mar, a track just north of San Diego.

SportsLog

Murray bows out in Cincinnati

Betts didn’t appreciate

harsh treatment in ’14

roughly thirteen months, Betts

had gone from a player consid-

ering the end of his baseball ca-

reer to one on the cusp of the

big leagues who’d been the best

player on the field on most

nights at four different levels of

the minors.

As he made a virtually seam-

less transition to center field

and then right, he’d fulfilled all

the on-field prerequisites. On

June 27, Betts and his fiancee

were headed out for pizza fol-

lowing a PawSox game when he

received a call from Kevin

Boles. Something had hap-

pened, the Pawtucket manager

said. Betts needed to return to

McCoy Stadium.

“It kind of scared me, hon-

estly,” said Betts.

It shouldn’t have. Boles sim-

ply wanted to deliver the news

face-to-face: Betts was getting

called up to New York. He made

his big league debut on Sunday

night in a nationally televised

game against the Yankees and

went 1-for-3 with his first hit (a

single) and a walk. Yet Betts

would soon be challenged in

ways that no one had expected.

During his ascent through

the minors, Betts had emerged

as one of the most popular play-

ers in the system, connecting

easily with players at every lev-

el. He frequently organized ac-

tivities and meals with team-

mates. In the majors, where

deference to

veterans was

expected, Bet-

ts didn’t feel

like he could

do the same.

Attempts to

create bridges

were at times

rebuffed by

teammates

with an im-

plied sugges-

tion that Betts

should respect

his place and

the nature of

seniority. Bet-

ts, in conver-

sations with

[manager

John] Farrell

and [general

manager Ben]

Cherington,

expressed con-

fusion.

The older players on the Red

Sox such as Jon Lester and John

Lackey weren’t necessarily ma-

licious so much as they were re-

peating the lessons they’d been

taught, in the same way that

they’d encountered them. That

said, as more and more players

were getting called up in 2014

and further altering the person-

ality of the previous year’s

champions, the tone of the vet-

erans hardened, the tough love

became ever tougher.

“We had the old-boy crew,”

said bullpen coach Dana Le-

Vangie. “They expected that

[the young players] were going

to go through the same [exple-

tive] that they did.”

The managers and coaches

uSPEIER

Continued from Page D1

— many with backgrounds of

coaching in the minors — didn’t

particularly care for it, but it

was difficult to ask the players

who’d been so good at minimiz-

ing their own mistakes the pre-

vious year to become suddenly

forgiving of them the next.

Then, during Betts’s first

homestand as a member of the

Red Sox, he had a close friend

from Nashville in town. Before

a game, he invited him into the

clubhouse. For Betts, who’d

grown up attached to his uncle’s

hip inside the

culture of pro-

fessional base-

ball, the idea

of a friend be-

ing in the

clubhouse be-

fore the game

seemed rela-

tively harm-

less — even if

Betts under-

stood that it

was inappro-

priate for his

friend to be

drinking a

beerasgame

time neared.

But to the Red

Sox veterans,

it was a signif-

icant trans-

gression for a

young player,

a point made

clear to him in

harsh terms.

As Betts would later explain,

it was an innocent mistake. “I

didn’t know those type of rules.

From what I knew, the club-

house is like your home.” But

other players saw it differently

and let Betts know it.

Betts’s sense of being an out-

sider was further heightened

just before the All-Star break.

Before a game in Houston, he

showed up to the clubhouse

hours before most of his team-

mates to take early batting

practice. With time to kill, Betts

stretched out to take a nap on a

couch. Again, the team’s veter-

ans jumped on him, and Betts

got called into Farrell’s office to

be advised on some of the un-

written rules of which he was

running afoul. (Hindsight sug-

gests Betts was a pioneer: a cou-

ple of years later, the Red Sox

installed a sleep room at Fen-

way, and encouraged players to

nap before games if so in-

clined.)

[Senior vice president of ma-

jor and minor league opera-

tions] Raquel Ferreira, perhaps

the most trusted voice for

young players in the organiza-

tion, reached out to Betts. She

ticked off a handful of trans-

gressions.

“He said, ‘Raquel, what am I

doing right?’ ” Ferreira remem-

bered. “I had to explain to him,

‘This team is losing. When

you’re losing, things become

magnified to a degree that you

have no control over. We want

you to be comfortable. Just

don’t act comfortable, because

there’s a difference.’

“But with that 2014 team,

they took things to another lev-

el, scrutinizing every little thing

that some guys did, where all it

takes is someone to pull you

aside and say, ‘Hey, don’t do

that.’ ”

Both [Xander] Bogaerts

and [Jackie] Bradley largely

believed the veterans had

good intentions, but Betts

couldn’t fathom why team-

mates would treat each other

in the fashion he experienced.

His struggle was reflected on

the field. He got sent back

down to Triple-A once in July

and again after a brief call-up

in early August.

For most, a demotion from

the big leagues to the minors

feels like a descent into purga-

tory. Nothing could have been

further from how Betts felt af-

ter being sent down for the sec-

ond time. He arrived in the

PawSox clubhouse, dropped his

bag with dramatic flair, and

pronounced, “I’m back.”

“It was almost a sigh of re-

lief,” said Betts. “I could go back

to Triple-A with all my boys and

I could have fun. Play the game,

have fun, I’m playing every day,

I can laugh and joke and all

those type of things.”

He felt at home again.

Brady urges calm on listing

By Nick Kelly
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
Tom Brady tried to allay
fears about his putting his
Chestnut Hill home on the
market, the Patriots quarter-
back said Monday on WEEI.
“You shouldn’t read into
anything. It takes a long time
to sell a house,” Brady said. “I
don’t know if you guys know,
my house is a little bit of an
expensive one, so it doesn’t fly
off the shelves in a couple of
weeks.
“I think I am at a point in
my life where there are a lot
of considerations that go into
playing. I have a very busy
professional life, I have a very
busy personal life, and any
decision that is made has to
consider everything.”
Brady, who added that he
loves building houses and
would consider becoming an
architectural designer when
he retires, said he loves play-
ing for the Patriots, and has a
great relationship with owner

Robert Kraft and coach Bill

Belichick. Brady signed a new

contract in early August,

which raised his pay for this

season, but which also left

him untethered to the Patri-

ots after it.

“This is the team that I

want to be a part of and lead-

ing, and I am really excited

about doing that,” Brady said.

“There’s really not that much

more to read into it than

that.”

Brady will wear a new hel-

met this season, and it’s tak-

ing time for him to adjust.

Brady’slasthelmet,the

Riddell VSR-4, is now banned

under a joint agreement be-

tween the NFL and NFL Play-

ers Association of approved

equipment for 2019. It’s the

helmet he has worn in the

past four Super Bowls.

Now, he is experimenting

with different models.

“I don’t really love the one

that I am in, but I don’t have

much of a choice,” Brady said.

“So I am just trying to do the

best I can to work with it.

“I hated to put [the VSR-4]

on the shelf, but that was

what they kind of said to do.

So that is kind of what I am

dealing with and I am kind of

working with something

else.”

Brady has taken a different

approach than Raiders wide

receiver Antonio Brown, who

threatened to retire from foot-

ball if not allowed to wear the

helmet he has worn his entire

NFL career. (Brown’s griev-

ance was denied Monday, and

the receiver stood down, re-

leasing a statement saying he

is “looking forward to rejoin-

ing my teammates on the

field.”)

Brown and Brady were two

of the 32 players who wore

one of the 11 now-banned

helmets last season.

Contact Nick Kelly at

[email protected]. Follow

him on Twitter @_NickKelly.

NIC ANTAYA FOR THE GLOBE

Before Tom Brady put some work in on the practice field, he tried to talk down Patriots
fans worried what listing of his Chestnut Hill mansion for sale could mean.

2014 FILE/MATTHEW J. LEE/GLOBE STAFF

Mookie Betts gave it his all on this play in left-center in 2014, but couldn’t come down with

the catch. Now the reigning MVP, he didn’t have the best experience as a rookie.

WILLIAM MORROW & COMPANY

The book jacket for Alex Speier’s “Homegrown: How the

Red Sox Built a Champion from the Ground Up.”

“Itwasalmosta

sighofrelief.I

couldgobackto

Triple-Awithall

myboysandI

couldhavefun.

Playthegame,

havefun,I’m

playingeveryday,

Icanlaughand

jokeandallthose

typeofthings.”

MOOKIE BETTS,after getting

demoted by the Red Sox back to

Pawtucket during the 2014

season