NESN ran a classic Red Sox game tonight. It's one that I'll go to my grave regretting I didn't attend.

It was April of 1986. I was a junior at Northeastern. During class, I was thinking that I would go over to Fenway that night. Keep in mind that in the mid-'80s you could pretty much walk up to the ticket window and get a pretty good seat. A bleacher seat cost $4.

After class I went back to my apartment and checked my schedule. I discovered that I had a meeting scheduled that evening; I don't even remember what it was about. I debated for a while whether I should blow off the meeting or go to the game. The Sox had a hot young pitcher going that I wanted to see. But I decided that I had committed to whatever this was and that I should go to the meeting.

I got back to my apartment around 10:30. There was no Internet worth speaking of at the time and we didn't have cable, so Sportscenter wasn't an option. The easiest way to get game scores was to call a recorded line the Boston Globe had set up. So I called and listened to the voice say, "Red Sox 3, Seattle 1, Roger Clemens 20 strikeouts".

That's right. I missed the Rocket setting the single-game strikeout record.

The great thing about watching the game was that I got to hear legendary Red Sox announcer Ned Martin do the play-by-play. Martin was the Sox radio voice for most of my childhood, and at this point he was doing TV on NESN along with Bob Montgomery. It was fun to hear him call a game again.

The big news of the day, of course, is that Mike Lowell signed a three year deal with the Sox. I'm sure all of Red Sox Nation is thrilled with the news, and it'll be great to have our World Series MVP out there getting his ring on Opening Day.