Ceddanne Rafaela made one of the best catches that you will ever see.

Aug 5, 2024; Kansas City, Missouri, USA; Boston Red Sox center fielder Ceddanne Rafaela (43) catches a fly ball in front of the center field wall against Kansas City Royals Maikel Garcia (not pictured) in the fifth inning at Kauffman Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Peter Aiken-USA TODAY Sports / Peter Aiken-USA TODAY Sports

Defense is one of those things in baseball that you either really don’t care about or that you love with all your heart. I can proudly say that I’m a huge fan of excellent defense (probably because I was a pitcher before anything else in baseball).

Something about seeing a player save runs, change games and steal outs just stands out to me.

On Monday night, Boston Red Sox rookie center fielder Ceddanne Rafaela made one of the most jaw dropping plays that has ever happened in the sport of baseball.

Rafaela was sprinting straight towards the wall at nearly his top speed as he tried to track down a flyball. As he was running, his feet hit the warning track right as he leapt in the air, reaching out a backhand to spear the ball out of the air right as he was crashing into the center field wall. It was truly one of the best defensive plays that I’ve ever seen.

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Ceddanne Rafaela’s unreal catch places him at Gold Glove level in the OF

Here’s that ridiculous play for those that haven’t seen it just yet:

Plays like this solidify a player in the conversation for the Gold Glove award at the end of the year. The first thing that anybody looks at when judging defense is the “Wow!” factor. Plays like this do that.

The next few things that people look into are errors and fielding percentage, followed by the advanced defensive statistics like defensive runs saved and outs above average. When taking a glance at these numbers for Rafaela, it’s easy to discredit him as a defender. He’s worth a negative amount of OAA.

But most of that has come at shortstop. When playing outfield, the rookie is worth six defensive runs saved, 2 outs above average and 3 fielding run value. That’s quite better than his surface numbers which all indicate that he’s a bad defender. Throw in the fact that he has elite speed and an elite arm and he jumps right to the top of the Gold Glove conversation.

It’s too early to really crown a Gold Glove winner at this point, but plays like that will stand out in voters’ minds. Rafaela definitely deserves some love when the voters are deciding on the award.