I don't think I've ever seen a play like that crazy infield hit off Winkler, which reflected some of the complexities of some shift plays. I suspect that Green and the analytics and the infielders might talk that one over, I suspect Bote maybe didn't play that one quite perfectly. But everything happens so fast, hard to diagnose on the fly.
Runner on 1st, lefty batter, shift on. With runner on, Bryant is on the bag, so not one of the no-hold shifts where Hoerner is playing in shallow RF. Sogard was only a step or two onto the grass, Baez stayed on the SS side of 2nd but he was still shading a bit up the middle, and Bote was playing pretty much like where a normal 2B might play. Baez and Bote were almost equidistant from 2b, and almost equally deep, right at the edge of the grass. Sharp grounder up the middle, Baez made a fine diving stop not far from 2nd, stretched out to stop it on the RF side of the bag. Less than two body lengths from the bag. Normally on a hard grounder up the middle that either middle infield snags, the other middle infielder covers the bag and takes the force throw. But with both guys equidistant from the bag, and the ball almost right over the bag, both players went for the ball, and Baez's diving stop carried him toward the RF side. Bote was heading towards center to try to stop the ball, not to the bag. So when Baez laid out, Bote was kinda behind him, sorta distant from the bag, and had to take a circuitous route to the bag. Baez made the stop with plenty of time to get the force, but then had nobody to throw it to. After using up time preparing to throw to 2B only to find nobody there, he threw way wild to 1st. Had Bote more quickly chosen to cover the bag instead of heading towards center, or simply been unblocked by Baez, it could have been a great stop and a nice force play. If Baez hadn't anticipated somebody being at 2nd to receive the short throw, he'd have had time to pop up and get the runner at 1st.
Just a really crazy play. Really lucky Frazier in the split second chose to try to advance to 2nd on the crazy throw, but Bryant got a great bounce and Bryant's throw beat Frazier to 2nd by a mile, so got an out anyway.
Another interesting thing is that Difo may have actually gotten to 3rd even if Baez hadn't made the crazy throw. Baez was on the ground behind 2nd; Bote was kind of bopping around off-balance on and off 2nd; I'm not sure there would have been anybody there to take a throw at 3rd even if Baez had not thrown to first, and if Difo had realized there was an uncovered 3B? Some crazy scenarios emerge sometimes with the shifts.