The ho-hums had seeped into the Boston baseball-following community over the past month. That's what living life 12 games out of first-place halfway through May will do.
But Monday night - with most of the New England sport world simply waiting for Celtics' tip-off 25 hours from first pitch - we were reminded that what might seem like an innocuous evening always had the potential for something memorable.
It happened on a night the Red Sox came away with a much-needed 6-3 win over the red-hot Astros at Fenway Park.
It started with one of the craziest first pitches in recent memory, was propelled by the timeliest of home runs (and subsequent celebration that went with it) and punctuated via a seemingly scripted chant-induced Xander Bogaerts homer.
THE FIRST PITCH
Steve Aoki - the heir to the Benihana fortune who has carved out his own niche as a world-famous DJ/music producer - did the honors.
Boy, did he ever. It was ... memorable.
THE MONEY GUNS
By the time the rain had stopped and the Red Sox and Astros were settling into the bottom the seventh, it was lining up as another 'oh, well' kind of night.
Another stellar outing by Garrett Whitlock (5 IP, 2 R) seemed destined to be spoiled thanks to an Astros 3-2 lead. But, seemingly out of nowhere, Trevor Story decided to surface his first real Fenway Park signature moment.
The second baseman took the third pitch of the bottom of the seventh over the left field wall to tie the game. And then came the celebration. The home run cart had taken on a new twist - money guns.
“Plough (Kevin Plawecki) gave it to me. I think it was (Alex Cora's) idea. I’m not sure. I’ll have to find out," Story said. He added, "It was cool. Didn’t know about them. Just kind of a surprise. Yeah, it’s all good fun. They just handed me the guns and I let them rip."
THE CHANT
While Red Sox fans try to pick through the causes of their team's existence, the constant conversation continues to be Xander Bogaerts' future.
It's why when the shortstop stepped to the plate with the game tied in the eighth inning with the Sox clinging to a one-run lead, the chants from the thinned-out Fenway crowd started to shower down.
"Re-sign Xander!"
Five pitches later ... boom ... two-run homer.
"Yeah, I heard it," Bogaerts said of the chant. "If I’d have struck out, it wouldn’t help my cause. He was throwing good pitches. He threw me a couple splitters. The last one I took before I hit the homer, I was like, after I took it, I was like, ‘Hey, that was a good take.’ He was tough. (Hector) Neris is tough. He just left a couple pitches over the plate. He had his stuff, so you had to be locked in.
"It’s always, you always feel the love and appreciation around here. Just coming up through the system and being here for a long time to this point, it’s been fun. A game that got a lot of rain, you don’t even know how many people are going to be sticking around and seeing if the game is going to go ahead. I heard it. I just told myself, ‘Listen, brother, just don’t strike out. Put it in play, see what happens – just don’t strike out.’"
What happened was the punctuation to a pretty memorable night. Who knew?
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