Red Sox's classy gesture leaves Cardinals manager beaming

For the all the money, hype and drama that goes into modern baseball, it’ll always be the game of fathers and sons — and that was put on display Tuesday as the Boston Red Sox came up with a classy gesture that left St. Louis Cardinals manager Mike Matheny beaming.

The Cardinals and Red Sox were playing in a Grapefruit League game at Fenway South. Matheny, of course, was there in the visitor’s dugout, but the Red Sox called out another Matheny — Mike’s son Tate, a 24-year-old in their farm system. Score one class point for new Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora.

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Tate Matheny isn’t in big-league camp with the Red Sox, but he joined the big-league team Tuesday and delivered the lineup card at home plate, meeting his dad there. In the stands was Ryker, Tate’s young son, meaning there were three generations of Matheny’s at the ballpark.

It was quite a special moment, as Joe Trezza of MLB.com and Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch tell us:

The Red Sox aren’t done there. They’ll visit the Cardinals at their spring home in Jupiter, Fla., on Friday and they’re planning to have Tate Matheny hit lead-off that day.

As Goold writes over at the Post-Dispatch in a nice story about Cora’s brief Cardinals ties, Cora and Matheny have a bond that dates back to 2012, when Cora was trying to make it with the Cardinals. Matheny had to cut Cora, then a 36-year-old big-league veteran, but earned his respect.

They both come from baseball families — as Cora’s brother Joey was a big leaguer before him. So both Matheny and Cora know that sometimes family is just as important as the game.

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Mike Oz is a writer at Yahoo Sports. Contact him at mikeozstew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @MikeOz