For about an inning and a half on Thursday the Tampa Bay Rays trailed by a couple of runs and actually appeared in danger of losing, or at least the concept seemed plausible.
It was a mirage.
Over their first 13 games, the rollicking Rays have been invincible, plowing past old benchmarks for early-season success and forcing historians to search back across three centuries to find anyone who did it better.
The Rays beat the Boston Red Sox, 9-3, Thursday in St. Petersburg, Fla., to extend their record to 13-0, yanking the attention of the baseball world away from rule changes and pace of play and refocusing it on one of the best starts to a season since players wore pillbox hats and cardigan sweaters.
Tampa Bay tied the modern era record, which dates to 1900, for consecutive wins to open a season, joining the 1982 Atlanta Braves and the 1987 Milwaukee Brewers. They open a weekend series against the Blue Jays in Toronto, and if the Rays win on Friday, they will stand apart from any big-league team currently in existence.