''I'd been a baseball fan since I was a kid,'' said Barrett, the team's second baseman who played with the Boston Red Sox from 1983-90, ''and I knew the longest game before that was 26 innings. So when we got to the 27th, I told everybody, 'We're playing in the longest game ever.' ''

They had gotten that far because Boggs had driven in the tying run in the bottom of the 21st, after Rochester had scored in the top of the inning to take the lead.

''I didn't know if the guys on the team wanted to hug me or slug me,'' said Boggs, a career .337 hitter with the Red Sox from 1982-93.

Hurst, one of the best left-handed pitchers in Red Sox history, worked the 28th through 32nd innings, allowing only two hits and striking out seven. He recalls striking out Rochester's Cal Ripken, another Hall of Famer, at about 4 a.m. on a 3-and-2 curveball.

''A 3-and-2 curve at 4 in the morning is a hard pitch to hit,'' joked Hurst.

The entire roundtable discussion was light and lively, drawing laughter and appluase from the capacity crowd estimated at about 400 people. When Morgan pointed that the PawSox made only one error in 33 innings, Boggs retorted: ''That's because nobody was making contact!'' Boggs also recalled a phone call he made to his father in Florida the next morning.

''I got four hits last night,'' he said.

''Hey, you had a good game!'' his father replied.

''Well, I did it in 12 at-bats,'' he admitted.

Barrett recalled that the statistics for the game didn't become official until the game ended, and many of the hitters were dreading the resumption because their batting averages would plummet when the numbers were included. ''I wasn't looking forward to that 2-for-12'' -- his performance in the game -- ''getting into the stats,'' he said. ''The pitchers, though, couldn't wait to get those numbers into the books,'' he said, since most of them pitched multiple scoreless innings.

Dallas Williams, a former Red Sox coach who played for Rochester that night, had the worst numbers of all; he went 0-for-13. Williams was in attendance today, along with former Red Wings Jim Umbarger, Tom Eaton, Ed Putman, John Valle, Steve Grilli (the losing pitcher), Keith Smith and Allan Ramirez.

The PawSox players at the luncheon, in addition to Boggs, Hurst, Barrett and Koza, included Jim Dorsey, Keith MacWhorter, Russ Quetti, Roger LaFrancois, Sam Bowen, Mike Smithson, Chico Walker, Luis Aponte, Russ Laribee, Ed Jurak and Mike Ongorato. Also on hand were Roarke, first-base umpire Tony Maners, and official scorer Bill George (whose scoreboard is on display at the Baseball Hall of Fame).

Weather permitting, the festivities will continue before tonight's PawSox game against the Columbus Clippers. The ceremony will begin at 7 p.m.

-- Journal sports editor Art Martone