On Big Papi's big night, a new Red Sox hero continues his rise

What Papi saw: Bogaerts celebrates at home.

During pregame ceremonies at Fenway Park honoring his 500th home run, David Ortiz punctuated his short speech by telling fans, "Let's hit some more bombs!" 

A few hours later, as Ortiz watched on deck, Xander Bogaerts took Big Papi up on his offer.

Bogaerts, who continues to emerge as the leader of the next generation of Red Sox players, hit a slider from Brandon Gomes for a grand slam in the eighth inning as Boston continued its string of strong play with an 8-7 win over Tampa Bay. As if to further emphasize Bogaerts' ascendance, his shot cleared the Green Monster in left field just a few feet to the left of the big "501" cards held up by fans to note Ortiz's current home run total.

Pedro and Papi had fun during the pre-game

Coupled with a run-scoring double high off the Monster in his previous at-bat in the seventh, Bogaerts had a 2-for-5 night with a career-high 5 RBI. The 22-year-old shortstop is now hitting .323 as he continues a late-season quest to overtake Detroit's Miguel Cabrera in the American League batting race. Cabrera, who went 1-for-4 in a 3-2 Detroit loss to the Chicago White Sox, is at .337.

An inning after his hitting heroics, Bogaerts showed another facet of his five-tool skills -- diving into the hole at short to grab a hard grounder off the bat of Tim Beckham and then spinning his body and throwing a perfect strike to first to help thwart Tampa Bay's final rally.

Will Bogaerts hit 500 home runs in his career? That remains to be seen. But in pushing the Red Sox out of last place for the first time since June 2 -- and to a 20-11 record over the past five weeks -- he is giving Fenway fans a glimpse at what might be his own long career of big hits.   

Xander Bogaerts could go from All-Star snub to batting champ

Miggy -- I want YOU! (Getty Images)

Look out, Miguel Cabrera, someone is gaining on you.

On Sept. 1, Xander Bogaerts was batting .316 after a 2-hit game against the Yankees. Cabrera, Detroit's dynamic first baseman, was at .359 after 2 hits of his own against the Royals -- and seemingly a lock for his fourth AL batting title.

In the three weeks since, while most New England sports fans focused on David Ortiz's quest for 500 home runs and the start of the Patriots season, Bogaerts has continued his season-long consistency at the plate. A slumping Cabrera, meanwhile, has seen his average hit a free-fall. 

Entering play tonight, Cabrera -- 1-for-21 in his last six games -- is at .335. While this mark still leads the league, Bogaerts has hit .375 for the month to make what was once thought a runaway into a race.

Miguel is mystified. (Getty Images)

The way both players are trending, Bogaerts has a real chance of wiping out the 14-point gap between them. After a .240 rookie season last year, Bogaerts has been one of the game's most consistent hitters all of 2015. He has batted .312 or better each of the past four months and his .345 mark since May 31 leads all of MLB.

Cabrera is headed in the opposite direction. Since a ground-ball single against the Royals his first time up on Sept. 10, he has gone hitless in 20 straight official at-bats (plus three walks). He hasn't homered in 18 games, and while he claims he's not injured -- he missed more than a month mid-season with a strained calf -- clearly something is not right.

Further working against Cabrera is the state of the two teams. Neither the Tigers or Red Sox is playing for the postseason, but while Boston has injected life into its late summer with a dynamic young nucleus including Bogaerts, Mookie Betts, and Jackie Bradley Jr., Detroit is essentially playing out the string with a lackluster lineup that offers their two-time MVP little protection.  

Young Guns are shining for Boston.

Just 17 games are left in Boston's season, so Bogaerts can't afford many off-days and nights if he's going to have a shot to overtake Cabrera. The way he's hit all year, however, it doesn't appear a slump is likely. 

Whatever happens, it will make for a fun few weeks of box-score glancing. 

Who needs the Yankees? Postseason could still bring high drama for Red Sox

Tito and Farrell could meet up again Friday.

Tito vs. Farrell. Drew vs. Iglesias. Big Papi against Crawford and A-Gon.

There may never be a playoff series at Fenway Park quite like the epic 2003 and '04 Red Sox-Yankees ALCS classics -- ending 86 years of misery against your arch-rivals is tough to top -- but this year's possible postseason opponents present plenty of intriguing scenarios for the Sox. 

As the Wild Card entries do battle over the next several days, we can have fun thinking about three great "what ifs" that could become reality:

Red Sox-Indians in the ALDS

Papi would be pumped to face the Indians.

Cleveland, which closed the regular season with 10 straight victories, will face the winner of Monday's Tampa Bay-Texas tiebreaker in the AL's one-game Wild Card "play-in" on Wednesday. Assuming he can prevail in the winner-take-all contest, Indians manager Terry Francona will return Friday night to Fenway Park -- his summer home for eight years and two World Series championships -- for the AL Division Series.

Francona got a loud and long ovation when the Indians came to Boston for four regular-season games in May, but now things really count. New Englanders are hungry for some playoff success in the Red Sox's first postseason berth since 2009, and current Boston manager John Farrell -- who served as Francona's pitching coach for five years with the Sox, including the '07 world championship squad -- will be attempting to beat his old boss and create some October glory of his own.

In addition to the Tito-Farrell storyline, a Red Sox-Indians series would match up the two most-improved teams in the American League; the Sox went from 69-93 to 97-65 this year, and the Indians from 68-94 to 92-70. In head-to-head play in 2013, Boston won six of seven from the club on which Farrell came to the majors and pitched for parts of five seasons.

Red Sox-Tigers in ALCS

In September, Iglesias was springy vs. the Sox.

Unlike Boston and Cleveland, Detroit surprised nobody with its strong showing in 2013. The Tigers, World Series runner-ups last fall, won their third straight AL Central title with a 93-69 record that was second only to Boston in the circuit. 

Detroit has one of baseball's best offenses, led by sluggers Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder, but it is their rookie shortstop who may get the bulk of the attention at Fenway were these two teams to meet. Jose Iglesias, the favorite to win both the AL's Rookie of the Year Award and a Gold Glove, was developed in the Boston farm system and spent the first four months of his freshman season with the Red Sox before going to Detroit in a three-way trade on July 30 that brought White Sox pitcher Jake Peavy to Boston.

Iglesias' average, which had hovered around .325 or higher most of the summer, fell off badly in September as skeptics long predicted. His glove, however, remains second to none, and a few dazzling plays in the field may have Boston fans wishing he was still around (even with Stephen Drew and Xander Bogarts both performing well at short for the Sox). 

The Tigers were 4-3 against Boston this year, but the Sox did win two-of-three at Fenway in September -- including a 20-4 shellacking in which they hit eight home runs. 

Red Sox-Dodgers in the World Series

Crawford and Gonzalez have something to prove.

It has been just a little over a year since the Big Trade of 2012, when Boston sent overpaid, underachieving, unhappy stars Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford, and Josh Beckett to the Dodgers along with Nick Punto and $12 million on Aug. 25 for a quintet of prospects. Unlike many transactions, this was definitely a move that helped both teams. 

The trade, which will save the Red Sox approximately $275 million in salaries and luxury tax over the course of all the players' contracts, freed up money for Boston to rebuild in 2013 with lower-priced, hungrier character players like Mike Napoli and Shane Victorino. These additions (and subtractions) helped turn the clubhouse atmosphere at Fenway completely around, and the result was a worst-to-first finish in the AL East.

Initially snickered at by Boston fans when the deal went down, Dodgers management has no problem with how things have turned out. Although Beckett suffered a major injury in his pitching hand that all but wiped out his '13 season, Gonzalez and Crawford have both been major contributors for Los Angeles -- which claimed the NL West title and is considered a favorite to win the pennant as well.

Like Edgar Renteria a few years back, Gonzales and Crawford rebounded once they left the pressure-cooker atmosphere of Boston for laid-back LA. The Red Sox, however, would have home-field advantage for the World Series, meaning both players would have up to four games with the probing eyes of Fenway once more upon them.

Hang on, Red Sox fans, it could be a very fun ride.   

Win the Triple Crown and not the MVP? Ted Williams did it– TWICE

Ted didn't always fly high with MVP voters.

With the AL MVP Award announcement coming later today, talk has heated up about whether Miguel Cabrera or Mike Trout should take home the hardware. Tigers fans who believe the Triple Crown should cinch the honor for Cabrera shouldn't be so fast to celebrate.

Ted Williams, a Hall of Famer acknowledged by many as the greatest hitter who ever lived, twice led the American League in homers, runs batted in, and batting average during the same season -- and was runner-up in the MVP race both times. 

In 1942, Williams hit .356 with 37 homers and 137 RBI, topping the majors in all three categories and helping the second-place Red Sox to their most wins (93) in 27 years. Long before sabermeterics came on the scene, Teddy Ballgame was tops in OBP (.499), OPS (1.147), and WAR (10.2) as well, in each case distancing the field like Secretariat at the Belmont Stakes.

It wasn't good enough. In a vote that shows even mid-20th century sportswriters didn't always choose the guy with the gaudiest "traditional" numbers, Williams was runner-up to Yankees second baseman Joe Gordon for MVP. 

Ted will forever rank among baseball's best.

A future Hall of Famer in his own right, Gordon hit .318 with 18 homers and 103 RBI, and was strong if not spectacular in the field. New York did win its second straight AL pennant, but Gordon was far from a one-man gang with Joe DiMaggio and Charlie Keller preceding him in the Yankees lineup. 

Some blamed the vote on Williams' sour relationship with the press, but the unfairly lofty expectations fans and sportswriters had for Ted undoubtedly played a part. He hit .406 in 1941, after all, so .356 was considered quite a drop-off. (Ironically, Williams finished second in the MVP race to Joe DiMaggio in '41, when Joe D. put together his 56-game hitting streak.)

Five years later, in 1947, it happened again. Williams paced the AL with 32 homers, 114 RBI, and a .343 average, along with otherworldly OBP (.499) and OPS (1.133) totals. The Red Sox, however, finished a disappointing third after winning the AL pennant in 1946 -- when Williams did win the MVP. 

The Yankees finished first in '47, as in 1942, and as in '42 a New York player (Joe DiMaggio) took home the MVP with far more modest (.315, 20, 97) totals. Joe D. was certainly a superior defensive outfielder to Williams, and was clearly the leader of his team, but the vote still seems unfair then and now. 

While legend long dictated (and Ted long thought) that a Boston sportswriter left Williams completely off his 10-man MVP ballot, this was actually not the case. As historian Glenn Stout later uncovered, Williams appeared on 23 of the 24 ballots, and it was a Midwestern writer who deemed him unworthy of his Top 10. 

Joe D. beat out Ted twice for MVP.

It's hard to imagine anyone thinking that 10 players had a better season than Williams in '47 or for that matter Cabrera this year. Just how many voters believe Mike Trout's overall performance as a hitter, fielder, and base runner makes him more valuable than a Triple Crown winner will be the key. 

And if Cabrera is the runner-up? Well, then he should think about finishing just short of a Triple Crown next year. Williams did that in 1949 -- when he paced the AL in homers and RBI but finished behind George Kell in batting, .34291 to .34276 -- and it was good enough for his second MVP honor.