Pop quiz, Mark Wagner: Can you remember the last time you tripled?

"No, I can't," Wagner said, rubbing at his chin. "Maybe if you gave me an hour to think about it."

Maybe a hint would help. You hit it three years ago while you were playing at Single-A Lancaster.

"I was going to say Lancaster," he said. "It was on the road. Maybe we were at home. I don't know."

No memory of it, then?

"No memory," he said. "I get hit in the head a lot. Too many foul balls."

No matter. Wagner now has two triples he can remember, the two triples he hit in the late innings against the Tampa Bay Rays on Monday. Wagner legged out a triple into the right-field corner in the seventh inning and sparked a late rally with another triple to the gap in left-center field.

(Rays left fielder Elliot Johnson made a dive at the second one but couldn't hold onto it.)

"It's spring training, so the legs are fresh, still," said Wagner, a catcher who already has been optioned to Triple-A Pawtucket. "I didn't have to catch too many innings before that.

"That why (strength and conditioning coach Dave Page) -- make sure you mention Pager's name -- is in there putting us through that rigorous testing. It keeps us strong."

The ninth-inning rally jolted a little intrigue into what started out as a one-sided game, especially with the way the Rays' hitters pounded Red Sox pitching. After Wagner's RBI triple, Chris McGuinness and Jorge Jimenez singled to set up an RBI double by Matt Sheely to pull the Red Sox within two runs.

Derrik Gibson then grounded back to the mound to end the game.

"It was a blast," Wagner said. "I know it didn't turn out the way we wanted, but just to get the life and energy going again, get the fans int it, it's fun making a run. You're not out until the last out."

"It perked the day up," Red Sox manager Terry Francona said. "It wasn't looking too great up to that point. A lot of young kids had fun and got our attention, and it gave us a little enthusiasm."

Wagner now is hitting .467 in 15 at-bats in his second spring training in major-league camp. More importantly, he's developing a comfort level with pitchers at all levels of the organization.

"I talk to (pitchers) more now than I did last year," he said. "I still talked to them last year, but this year is a little bit more in terms of how they like to pitch, how they want to attack guys a little bit more as opposed to just sitting back and observing or maybe asking one of the other guys or letting them do their thing."