BOSTON - Before James Wood ever stepped into the batter’s box at Fenway Park on Monday, he had already done the sightseeing.
Wood walked over to the bleachers and climbed up to Section 42, where Row 37, Seat 21 is painted red. The spot marks Ted Williams’ legendary 502-foot home run from June 9, 1946, and the seat has served as a hitting target for left-handed batters since it was painted in 1984.
After that pregame detour, Wood gave the ballpark a show.
In his first career at-bat at Fenway, Wood launched a leadoff homer to right field off Red Sox left-hander Ranger Suarez. The Nationals outfielder’s 21st home run of the season - and sixth leadoff shot of the year - traveled a Statcast-projected 441 feet and came off his bat at 113.6 mph.
“It felt good,” Wood said after the Nationals’ 6-3 loss to the Red Sox. “It felt like I hadn’t put a swing on a ball like that in a little bit.”
Wood said Nationals hitting coach Matt Borgschulte and several players had been talking about the marker before the trip to Boston, and once they got to Fenway on Monday, they went to see it for themselves.
“The whole time, especially when we got up there, we were trying to do all the math of how it could even be possible,” said Wood. “And we don’t think it’s possible.”
That kind of distance has been the stuff of baseball myth for 80 years, and no one has duplicated it - not even David Ortiz with an aluminum bat. Wood, 23, wasn’t buying the idea that a ball could realistically travel that far up the wall.
“It’s 30 rows up,” Wood explained. “From where the fence is at that point, it’s like 380 [feet].
And it’s another 120 feet, probably. So I don’t really care how much the wind was blowing.
To hit it that far in the air and get it that high up, you’re three-quarters of the way up the Monster. So I’m not buying it.”
Wood’s blast went to right field, landing in rows behind the Nationals’ bullpen. It was his third leadoff homer this season to clear 440 feet, and since Statcast began tracking in 2015, only four players have hit more leadoff homers in a season: Ronald Acuña Jr. with seven in 2023, Kyle Schwarber with five in 2023, Acuña with four in 2021 and George Springer with four in 2019.
The homer also showed off just how loud Wood’s bat can be. It was the 10th home run of his career at 113 mph or harder. Since his debut on July 1, 2024, Wood leads all Nationals players in the Statcast era with 23 homers at 110 mph or more, ahead of Juan Soto’s 21 and Bryce Harper’s 20.
Only the Rays’ Junior Caminero has hit a home run at Fenway Park this season with a faster exit velocity, clocking in at 114.3 mph.
The timing mattered, too. Wood had not homered since June 14 against the Mariners, and he came into the game hitting just .135 (7-for-52) with a .429 OPS over his previous 13 games.
“He got an advantage count there to start the game and got a good fastball to hit and did some damage on it,” manager Blake Butera said. “He has been going through it a little bit, so it was good to see him get a good swing off there early for us and get going a little bit.”
Butera said Wood had been “a little bit too rotational” and trying to pull the ball, and that the staff had been working with him on staying on time and balanced so he could drive the ball back through the middle.
“There’s going to be ebbs and flows throughout the long season,” said Butera. “That’s why I think our coaches do such a good job of diagnosing these things pretty early and are able to help put in some fixes.”
Whether Wood makes another Fenway pilgrimage remains to be seen. Maybe the Green Monster is next. For now, though, he left Boston with a reminder that even if Ted Williams’ marker still stands alone, a 441-foot homer is a pretty solid way to answer it.
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