Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts joked Friday that he’ll never sprint again a day after he fell flat on his face in a race with second baseman Hyeseong Kim during a World Series workout.
Adding some levity to Thursday’s workout in Toronto, Roberts raced Kim and fell while rounding second.
Kim stood on first base and Roberts stood near the cutout, where a runner would take his lead.
Rounding second, Roberts stumbled and fell. The 53-year-old manager feigned a hamstring injury after getting up.
“I clearly wasn’t thinking,” Roberts said. “I was trying to add a little levity, that’s for sure. I wasn’t trying to do a face-plant at shortstop, and yeah, the legs just gave way. That will be the last full sprint I ever do in my life. And I paid my debt, because there was a little wager, so I did owe up.”
Roberts said he got some “meds in me. I’m still going to post. I’m probable. So it’s good. Recovered. Not my best decision, but it worked out.”
Second baseman Miguel Rojas said it made him smile and shows Roberts is willing to do anything for the team to break the tension of facing elimination.
“I just think he had a better chance going straight from first to third on a straight line,” Rojas joked. “I think that was the initial thought of the race, but then he wanted to prove a point that he can beat him from that start, and it wasn’t enough. We all saw the results.”
Roberts said he had heard from his family about the race, and his kids “weren’t too excited for me about it.”
Besides managing the Dodgers, Roberts is perhaps best known for a key stolen base for Boston against New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera when the Red Sox won it all in 2004.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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