There's nothing quite comparable to a walk-off win at Fenway Park, and Boston fans received this precious opportunity tonight as a one-out bloop single by Xander Bogaerts drove in a sprinting Mike Napoli to send the city in to its Marathon weekend on an optimistic note with a 3-2 victory.
Orchestrated in perfect fashion, the inning began with a four-pitch walk of Napoli by the wild Orioles reliever Brian Matusz, and an admirably-executed sacrifice bunt by outfielder Daniel Nava followed immediately after.
This set the stage for Bogaerts, who erased any skepticism of his nagging shoulder injury with a precisely-placed knock directly in between Baltimore second baseman Jonathan Schoop and right fielder Travis Snider to drive in the game-sealing run.
What made the victory even more impressive was that Boston failed to muster a single hit until the fifth inning, just four overall. Boston was unable to lay a finger on the dominant Ubaldo Jimenez throughout the game's opening stanza.
Despite his obliteration of a helpless Boston lineup early on, he hit Pablo Sandoval in the fourth inning in what appeared to be an action of retaliation for the Panda's second-inning slide into second to break up a possible double play. Jimenez was thrown out ending his night with 3 2/3 innings of no-hit ball.