It was one of those things that immediately made you say “Oh [expletive]!”

With two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning of a basically meaningless (but insanely fun) intrasquad game at a fan-less Dodger Stadium with artificial crowd noise pumped in, four-time All-Star, four-time Gold Glover, three-time Silver Slugger, 2018 AL MVP, 2018 MLB Player of the Year, 2018 Wilson Overall Defensive Player of the Year and 2018 World Series champion Mookie Betts fouled off a 1-2 pitch off of Dodgers right-hander Josh Sborz. Immediately after doing so, Betts hunched over and clutched his left hand in his right.

“Oh [expletive]!”

A few seconds later (which seemed like hours), Betts stood back up and began walking around in front of the Dodgers home dugout, where Dodgers manager Dave Roberts had rushed out to check on him. Betts assured his manager that he was fine, but continued shaking his left hand before finally getting back into the batter’s box.

After fouling off another pitch, the 27-year-old Nashville, TN native and former fifth-round draft pick by the Boston Red Sox in 2011 out of Overton High School in Nashville, TN, again walked around shaking his left hand and again took several moments before re-entering the batter’s box. He fouled off yet another pitch and again took his time to re-enter the box and eventually struck out swinging.

Because of strict COVID-19 health and safety protocols, there are no postgame interviews with players or with Roberts. However, during his daily Zoom media briefing on Saturday morning, Roberts assured reporters that his star outfielder is fine.

“He is okay, and I had a little… the same thought crossed, but I asked him, and I haven’t heard anything from the training staff,” Roberts said. “So, we’re going to do a little simulated situation with [Ross] Stripling, and so we’ll see if he wants to be in there or not. But if he chooses not to, it’s not because of the hand. His hand is fine.”

Stay tuned…

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