More than one sports news outlet noted that Friday is the fifth anniversary of Aaron Boone's ALCS-ending home run that sent the Yankees to the World Series in 2003.

If you've been watching ESPN's highlights of Thursday night's Game 5, you're being  reminded repeatedly that J.D. Drew's game-ending single to beat the Tampa Bay Rays came exactly five years to the minute — 12:16 a.m. Eastern — of Boone's homer against Tim Wakefield in '03.

And the significance of this is?

Combined, these two moments in baseball history barely meet the qualifications for coincidence, much less irony, as ESPN and others such as the New York Times baseball blog would have you believe. ESPN and the NYT again show their "if it involves the Red Sox or Yankees, even speciously, it must be reported — with extreme prejudice" mentality.

If someone wants to claim linkage, they need more than "12:16" or some sort of hex that was probably exorcised the next year when the Red Sox won the World Series. Like anyone should have been keeping track of the time when Boone won the game. Seriously, it's not even that late. Everyone wants to get all Vin Scully with the time stamp, but it usually has such little importance, it's just adding unnecessary adjectives.

There are other differences, possibly infinite ones, between Boone 12:16 and Drew 12:16.

Follow the jump for some of them:

• Boone's moment came at Yankee Stadium, not Fenway Park

• He hit a home run; Drew's hit left the yard only on a bounce.

• Boone's came in a Game 7, not a Game 5

• Boone played for the Yankees, who are not involved in this season's playoffs last time anyone checked

• Tim Wakefield did not pitch in Thursday's game

• Jason Varitek and David Ortiz are the only two other current Red Sox players on that '03 team.

• Boone's homer beat the Red Sox, not the other way around; Boston's great comeback against the Yankees came in '04

Related: 2008 MLB playoffs, 2008 ALCS - Red Sox vs. Rays