A gorgeous Sunday afternoon. It’s Visor Day, and they’re giving out posters with Tek and Wally promoting reading. Pokey takes BP, a reason for optimism. I’m in my favorite spot for BP, hauling in balls, when Placido Polanco rips a hooking liner our way. “Heads UP!” I bellow, because it’s going to be a few rows into the crowd behind me. I expect it to bang into a plastic seatback, like most screamers, but this one hits skin—and not the fat smack of a thigh or biceps, but a spongy, fungolike sound, unmistakable: it nailed somebody in the head. The ball ricochets at a right angle another ten rows into the stands, and a bald guy in his late fifties who was coming down the aisle reels sideways into the seats, still holding his two beers.

He wobbles like a fighter trying to stay upright until people take him under the arms and sit him down. He looks dazed, mumbling that he’s all right. I’m already waving to security to get a trainer out here, medical staff, somebody.

Former Sox pitching coach Joe Kerrigan has been pacing the wall all BP, warning kids to keep their eyes on the batters. He gets a ball for the guy, and is standing there talking to me about how dangerous this place is—how Yankee Stadium’s the same way down third—when Polanco stings one right at us. It skips once on the track, Joe backs off a step, and I glove it.

When BP ends, I check on the bald guy. He’s sitting down, surrounded by security and a couple first-aid guys. On the side of his dome he’s got a purplish knot the size of a fried egg. I think he should go to a hospital—at the very least he’s got a concussion—but he’s talking with them, giving them his information. He wants to stay for the game.

Trudy’s over at Steve’s seats. She saw all the hubbub; people around her thought it might be a heart attack.

She shows me that the souvenir-cup makers have fixed the SHILLING. “He must have a good agent,” she says.

The pregame ceremonies pay tribute to all the middle-aged guys who took part in the Sox’s pricey fantasy camp. They fill the baselines, stepping forward and doffing their caps as Carl Beane announces their names. No one except their families is paying attention until two guys on the third-base line unfurl a messily spray-painted bedsheet that says YANKEES SUCK. It gets a big hand, but, in typical Fenway fashion, when the guys walk by us on their way off, someone behind me hollers, “Is that the best you could do with the sign?”

June 28th