Opening Day! When hope springs eternal and championship dreams take flight as fathers and sons, friends and family reunite to attend America’s pastime and cheer on their beloved local baseball team. Everyone is undefeated and anything is possible, so this is when expectations, like game-winning home runs, should soar, right?
In the case of Red Sox fans in 2023…maybe not so much.
On a chilly and brisk late March Opening Day 2023 outside of Fenway Park we caught up with Red Sox fans to give them a chance to weigh in on how they thought the Sox would do this season. If the response ownership and management received at Red Sox Winter Weekend from Sox fans was any indication, then there would be little optimism to be found. A muted response might be expected, given the team’s struggles in 2022, not to mention the loss of familiar names like J.D. Martinez and Xander Bogaerts.
Despite the cold temps and roster shuffling, a mix of optimism, high hopes, reality checks and despondency was to be found amongst the Fenway Faithful in attendance. The AL East is loaded and the gambling win total on the team is only 76.5, so most outside New England don’t think the team has much of a chance to matter in 2023. Yet there are some new faces who could turn things around. Plus, it’s Opening Day! Have some fun…or at least grab a sausage and momentarily get lost in the idea of returning to October baseball when it’s not even April yet. It’s a long season and there’s plenty of time for reality later.
Watch the video in the player at the top of this post or via Youtube below: