One of those nights took place Thursday against the woeful Baltimore Orioles staff, which had to endure six home run trots from six different Boston hitters in a 10-4 Red Sox rout.
The barrage of round-trippers established a new season high for Boston, besting the previous mark by two, and saw the rare back-to-back-to-back job accomplished in the seventh, when David Ortiz, Josh Reddick and Jarrod Saltalamacchia brought the fans at Fenway Park into a delirious state.
"There was a lot of good pitches tonight, and we didn't miss them," said Dustin Pedroia, whose three-run shot in the third was the first of the six home runs and gave the Red Sox a 3-2 lead.
Pedroia's homer, which came after Orioles starter Jake Arrieta walked the first two men of the inning, cleared the Monster seats by plenty. Nobody knew it at the time, but it was a trend-setter, in more ways than one. Not only did several of his teammates join Pedroia in touching them all, but there seemed to be a competition as to who could cause the most jaws to drop.
Adrian Gonzalez made his bid with a solo shot in the fifth that tattooed the concrete wall beside the camera stand in center field, an absolute rope that may have traveled another 50 feet or more if not for the wall. Some said it appeared to still be rising when it smacked high above the 379 foot sign.
Jacoby Ellsbury got into the act one inning later with a two-run moon shot down the right-field line that only needed to stay fair — there was plenty of distance. And then came the trio of blasts in the seventh, conveniently laid out to all fields in impressive fashion.
Ortiz started it by hammering a 3-2 fastball off lefty Pedro Viola on a line into the center field bleachers. Like Gonzalez's shot, it was a line drive that escaped the yard remarkably quick. Not to be outdone, Reddick took the southpaw deep to right, his first career home run against a left-hander. Saltalamacchia made it three in a row with a bomb to left on an 0-2 fastball.
Each of the six shots provided a reason or two to be discussed, either due to the count on the hitter, the distance the ball traveled, the location of the pitch or the ferocity with which it was struck.
"We had a variety," Ellsbury said, as if describing a fruit bowl. "One monster ball, two to dead center, a few to right. They were all pretty good swings. You can't go wrong with any one of them."
The display of power helped turn a so-so Andrew Miller outing into another win for the lefty and established a handful of "first since" moments. If you're not clear on what those are, here is a sample:
- The Sox slugged six home runs for the first time since Sept. 8, 2009, when they turned the trick against the same opponent in the same park.
- The Ortiz-Reddick-Saltalamacchia display marked the first time the team has hit three straight homers since Aug. 13, 2010, when Ortiz, Adrian Beltre and J.D. Drew did it in Texas.
- With Ellsbury, Pedroia and Gonzalez each going deep, Boston had home runs from its top three hitters in the lineup for the first time since June 15, 2008, when Ellsbury, Pedroia and Drew did it in Cincinnati.
- Adding in doubles by Ortiz and Kevin Youkilis, the lineup amassed eight extra-base hits for the second straight game for the first time since it did so in three straight contests in June 2003.
Manager Terry Francona was asked if he gave any thought to seeing Drew go deep when he came up after Saltalamacchia in the seventh, which would've given the Sox four straight homers for the first time since that memorable occasion against the Yankees in 2007. Always focused on the bottom line, Francona shrugged aside the assertion that he even considered that a possibility.
Still, he loved what he saw from his offense.
"The guys did a great job. We scored and we added on," Francona said. "Pedey with a big hit early, put us back in it. Kept fighting and getting big hits the rest of the way."
Not a bad way for the Red Sox to move back into first place, exactly where they hoped they would be when they were put together this winter.
