In order to get an inside-the-park home run, we generally need three ingredients: 

  1. Ball hit to the outfield (this isn't Little League). 
  2. Something weird happens in the outfield, including possibly the stadium knocking the ball in funny directions or just a terrible defensive play.
  3. The hitter has to have some speed.

Now let's take a look at Eduardo Nunez of the Red Sox against the Rays in the Trop on Thursday. 

Under No. 2, that would be Denard Span and Kevin Kiermaier doing a pretty terrible collective job there, allowing Nunez to use his wheels to get around the bases for the inside-the-park job. It's pretty basic stuff in the gap to have someone backing up the guy who is going for the ball, but it didn't happen here. 

Nunez becomes the first Red Sox player with an inside-the-park home run on opening day since 1968, when Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski did it, per Red Sox notes on Twitter. 

Quite the fun feat on what has already been a pretty fun opening day.