Red Sox hero is 17-year-old fan in the stands

BOSTON -- Danny Vinik has been to dozens of games at Fenway Park, often sitting in box seats not far from the Red Sox dugout.

When your dad is a multimillionaire hedge fund manager and one of the team’s limited partners, you tend to get first pick when it comes to premium tickets.

But the 17-year-old “sometimes second baseman” had never caught a foul ball before Friday -- and for the Red Sox, his timing couldn’t have been better.

With two on, one out and Boston trailing by a run in the fifth inning of Game 2 of the American League Division Series, Manny Ramirez lofted a high foul toward the seats to the right of home plate. Angels catcher Jeff Mathis quickly gave chase, reaching over a photographer’s well to make the. . .

Well, almost make the catch. Just before the ball reached Mathis’ glove, it plopped into Vinik’s hands -- which were inside the catcher’s mitt. As a result, Vinik had a souvenir and a few pitches later Ramirez had a walk, setting up Mike Lowell’s game-tying sacrifice fly to center.

Four innings after that Ramirez broke the tie, giving the Red Sox a 6-3 victory and a 2-0 lead in the American League Division Series with a walkoff three-run home run.

“I thought I might have had it,” Mathis said. “I felt something hit my glove. I didn’t know if it was his hands or the ball.

“The kid made a good play.”

Maybe the Red Sox’s best play of the night. Because without it maybe the Angels take a lead into the ninth. Maybe Francisco Rodriguez starts the inning on the mound. Maybe the Angels don’t walk David Ortiz.

And maybe Manny Ramirez never gets a chance to hit a game-winning homer.

“I had a chance at it,” said Mathis, who said he didn’t think interference should have been called since he was reaching into the stands. “I just didn’t end up with it.”

Angel Manager Mike Scioscia praised his catcher: “It was a heck of an effort by Jeff, but when you go into the stands all bets are off. I don’t know if he got the ball in his glove., I didn’t see a replay. Or if he got it before it hit his glove. But when you’re reaching in there, all bets are off.”

And for his part Vinik wound up with more than just a baseball. He also landed a permanent place in Red Sox lore. The Cubs have Steve Bartman, who may have cost the team a playoff game when he took a foul ball out of Moises Alou glove in 2003. And now the Red Sox have Vinik, who helped them win one by taking a ball out of Mathis’ glove Friday.

As Vinik walked up the aisle at the end of the fifth inning, fans stood and applauded. In the concourse, another fan nominated him for president of Red Sox Nation -- again to loud applause.

“I still can’t really remember that well” what happened, said Vinik, son of Jeffrey N. Vinik, one of 15 limited partners listed in the Red Sox media guide. “I just reached over and tried to make the play. I just kept the ball.

“I really don’t remember.”

The Angels, on the other hand, aren’t likely to forget.

“They have good fans here,” a disappointed Mathis said.

As for Vinik, who said his cellphone lit up with more than a dozen congratulatory calls from friends after his nationally televised moment of fame, he knew he was part of something special as soon as he saw the reaction around him.

“More or less when I started getting jumped on and applauded and high-fives and everything,” said Vinik, whose father immediately put the ball in a box for safekeeping. “I kind of realized it.”

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kevin.baxter@latimes.com