Never mind the baseball: Red Sox home opener remains a can't-miss event

For thousands of Red Sox fans, the annual home opener at Fenway Park is a rite of spring.

It's also a way of marking time. Twenty years after the 2004 Sox snapped an 86-year championship drought, the team and its fans were commemorating that improbable win at the start of a less promising season.

Still, in many ways, Boston's Opening Day looked much the same as ever Tuesday. Even three hours before the first pitch against the Orioles, businesses around Fenway Park had kicked into high gear: kiosks, carts and hawkers selling tickets, programs, T-shirts, and — of course — sausages.

Anne Ramian, known to her regulars as 'Mama,' couldn't count how many seasons she’s been working behind her Lansdowne Street grill. But after some winter downtime, she's glad to be back in action: “A lot of the customers, they become like my friends ... Truthfully, it’s nice to be missed!”

If opening day is always a kind of family reunion, this year it had some special guests. An hour before game time, members of the 2004 Red Sox — among them David Ortiz, Manny Ramirez and Theo Epstein — pulled onto Lansdowne Street in Duck Boats.

They disembarked to a hero’s welcome. Fans acknowledged that group changed everything for Red Sox Nation: ending decades of frustrating irrelevance, and kicking off a golden age for the franchise, with four World Series wins in the following 14 years.

The Sox on Tuesday paid tribute to two recent losses from that era. The team's ex-president Larry Lucchino died earlier this month. And every player was wearing a hat marked #49 for knuckleballer Tim Wakefield, who died of cancer last fall.

The heroes of 2004 changed the city's expectations of its ball club. But as they were whisked into Fenway Park for a ceremony, they left some fans grumbling about this year’s team, which, after a quiet offseason, is not expected to go far.

“I just wish ownership would put more back into this team — this organization deserves it," said Stephen Schmitz of Woburn, set to attend his first home opener. "They don’t deserve to be run like a small-market organization. This is Boston, for crying out loud.”

Schmitz did come, in part, to celebrate the curse-breakers. And for many, opening day at Fenway is a ceremony itself, not to be missed. This game, at least, was a sellout — and team staff report they've sold nearly 1.7 million tickets so far, on pace with last year.

The crowd for the opener was full of people who have turned out for decades, to see the likes of Yastremszki to Boggs to Pedro to Pedroia — with a lot of so-so baseball in between. One couple was marking their third anniversary at the game, with a combined 52 opening days between them. Others hailed from the Berkshires, Vermont, Dallas and Tokyo.

Richard, a fan from Amherst who guessed he's been to 40 home openers, has seen a lot of losing. Still, he was thrilled to be there for number 41: “Weather like this? The Sox, whether they’re good or bad, makes no difference. It’s opening day ... It's like a religion."

And the faithful were challenged once more on Tuesday: The Sox lost to Baltimore, 7-to-1.

This story was updated to give the full name of the sausage vendor.