On Wednesday night, Team Puerto Rico matched up against the Boston Red Sox in a Grapefruit League showdown.
Former St. Louis Cardinals catcher and future Hall-of-Famer Yadier Molina is the manager of Team Puerto Rico.
Molina is a native of Puerto Rico and played his entire career in St. Louis.
His fellow Puerto Rican, Alex Cora, is the manager of the Red Sox.
Prior to Wednesday night’s game, the Red Sox manager shook hands with the Cardinals legend as the two delivered lineup cards to the umpiring crew.
The Red Sox posted a photo of the two shaking hands and exchanging lineup cards before the game on Twitter.
A couple of managers. 🇵🇷 pic.twitter.com/GHgDqjYCiu
—Red Sox (@RedSox) March 9, 2023
The World Baseball Classic is finally underway.
However, before things got going, it was important that these two got a chance to reunite.
Cora played 14 seasons in Major League Baseball, spending most of his time with the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Red Sox.
He signed a minor league deal with the Cardinals back in the spring of 2012, but never made it to the big-league club.
Still, these two know each other well, having competed against each other on various occasions.
The Red Sox ended up winning the game by a 9-3 final, defeating one of their own in super utilityman Enrique Hernandez, who is playing under Molina on Team Puerto Rico.
But baseball is always filled with good-natured moments, such as the one shared between Molina and Cora before the first pitch on Wednesday.
Team Puerto Rico will get going this weekend in the WBC.
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