Sox 2004 On May 15, 2004, when Red Sox regular starting third baseman Bill Mueller was placed on the disabled list, Youkilis was called up for the first time. "I didn't sleep much", Youkilis said. "I got about four hours of sleep. … They told me the night before I was playing.... I got in there, and man, I was just amped up and excited." During his first major-league game in Toronto, with his parents watching from the second row behind the dugout, Youkilis (in his second at bat) homered against 1996 Cy Young Award winner Pat Hentgen, becoming just the seventh player in team history to hit a home run in his first game. As a prank, the team initially gave Youkilis the silent treatment when he returned to the dugout after his homer. "This one will go down probably as the greatest day of my life", he said. Later, Youkilis was swept up in the team's ritual annual hazing, in which he and other rookies were made to wear skimpy Hooters waitress outfits, orange satin shorts and tight, clingy white tank tops, for the team trip from Canada through US Customs in Florida. "I walked into the locker room, and all my clothes were gone", Youkilis said. "There was just a Hooters outfit and shoes." Youkilis was named the American League (AL) Rookie of the Month for May, after leading AL rookies with nine walks and a .446 OBP as he batted .318 with 7 RBI, and 15 runs in 13 games. Noting ways that his life had suddenly changed, he said: "I'm staying in the best hotel I've ever stayed in, and my paycheck has quadrupled." In mid-July he was sent back down to AAA, however, to make room for Ramiro Mendoza, though he was brought up again towards the end of the season. On September 24, which was Yom Kippur, Youkilis appeared in the dugout in uniform, but declined to participate in the game out of deference to the religious holiday. Youkilis was named the club's Rookie of the Year by the Boston chapter of the Baseball Writers' Association of America. For the season, in 44 games, he saw an average of 4.67 pitches per plate appearance, first among major leaguers with at least 90 plate appearances. As Youkilis observed, "Fighting off pitches, fouling off pitches, laying off pitches, making it so the opposing pitcher can't