Sox staying at same hotel as Obama
NEW YORK -- There was some buzz around the Red Sox at the team hotel on Monday in Manhattan, as the club is sharing quarters with President Barack Obama for the next few days.
President Obama is in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, while the Red Sox are in town for a four-game series against the Yankees.
Long-time Red Sox radio broadcaster Joe Castiglione got a grainy cellphone photo of Obama working out in the hotel gym.
"I didn't have the [guts] to take a selfie like David [Ortiz]," said Castiglione. "He was really working hard on the treadmill and then he went and did some dumbbells."
Red Sox interim manager Torey Lovullo had some light-hearted moments talking about the president in his pregame news conference on Monday.
"I just missed the president," said Lovullo. "He had left the workout room about 10 minutes before I got in there. But he just walked in there as a civilian, which is great. Everybody got wanded before they went in there from what I heard."
Lovullo will try to get a first-hand look at Obama by Tuesday.
"The moral of the story is I'm working out earlier tomorrow," Lovullo said. "It's exciting that we're staying at the same place as the president of the United States."
The way Lovullo looks at it, he has an "in" with the president, considering the Red Sox were guests at the White House on April 1, 2014, in celebration for winning the World Series the year before.
"I'm going up to him. You know why? He invited me to his house two years ago," Lovullo said. "I'm going to say, 'I came to your house and I sat on your South Lawn.' He's going to remember me, no doubt in my mind. If he's a civilian, you don't feel like I can pull that one off? Maybe go over and do a couple of curls and say, 'Hey, it's me, Torey."'
Worth noting
• David Ortiz was out of Boston's starting lineup for the second time in three days. It turns out it's just maintenance, as Lovullo admits he probably played Ortiz a little too much during his pursuit of 500 home runs.
"I've been having discussions with David for the past couple of weeks. He has been after me to let him play," said Lovullo. "[He] played beyond the days he was supposed to play from a medical perspective. There's some very strict guidelines with David, because of his feet and that [Achilles] area and he just needs time off.
"But he was feeling good, he was swinging the bat well, he was chasing 500 home runs. I certainly didn't want to interrupt any of that. So he played beyond off-days, because he wanted to and he was on a roll. So now we're just catching up to some of his off-days."
• Mookie Betts made his first start in center field since Sept. 15. The Red Sox are experimenting with their outfield, and Betts had been getting reps in right.
"I felt like I didn't want to let center field get too far away from Mookie. So I was going to sprinkle him into center field from time to time," said Lovullo. "I hadn't quite drawn up the exact playbook or the soft template, but I knew that I wanted to give him some looks in center field."
• Closer Koji Uehara, whose season ended on Aug. 7 with a fractured right wrist, played catch before Monday's game. Uehara is expected to be ready for the start of Spring Training.