Former longtime Nashua Pride manager Butch Hobson and the team's ever popular mascot, Monkey Boy, embrace on the field Friday night during the Silver Knights game at Holman Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – Butch was back, and he wasn’t alone.

You couldn’t go two feet at Holman Stadium on Friday night without seeing some semblance of a Nashua Pride jersey, as the clock was indeed turned back.

Former longtime Pride manager Butch Hobson, the main attraction, drew a standing ovation from the huge crowd of 3,213. Hobson even coached a couple of innings at third base for the Nashua Silver Knights, and several other former Pride players, staffers, etc. – including original owner Chris English – were on hand. And so was the World Famous Monkey Boy, as well as PA announcer Ken Cail.

As the song says, Oh What a Night.

“It was good, a little nostalgic, you know what I mean,” said former Pride slugger Glenn Murray. “To see El Guapo (former Red Sox and Pride closer Rich Garces) and Butch?”

The last time Murray, who still lives in Nashua, saw Hobson was in 2008.

“And the bat girl (Lindsay Davis),” he said, “is 32.”

Turn Back The Clock indeed.

Hobson was also – to his surprise – inducted into the Nashua Lions Club Legends of Holman Hall of Fame. His name will be added to those on the HOF plaque that is inside the main entrance.

“That was very, very, special,” Hobson said. “Very touching. … It was a very, very, very special day for me. I cherish all these moments. It was an awesome, awesome, awesome day for me. It was a great experience. I’m 73 years old. I sit home and watch baseball on TV and hold a ball in my hands, and I can smell it.”

“It’s awesome,” said former Pride general manager Todd Marlin, who still resides in the area, in Litchfield. “I told John (owner Creedon, Jr.) I knew how to sneak in, I didn’t go through the front gate because I knew all the places you could go in.

“But it’s fabulous. To walk back here and see some of these faces, 27 years ago. Some I haven’t seen for 10 or 15 years. Some of us are getting older. We all have some special memories of this place. It’s cool.”

In fact, Marlin looked at some of the fans wearing Pride jerseys, “and I remember designing that. I remember sitting in 100 Main Street, going through logos together, picking this and that.”

Garces closed out the clincher for Nashua’s 2007 Can Am League championship at Fraser Field in Lynn, Mass. “You still have those feelings,” Garces said. “Playing here, everything was the fans. That feeling was one of those games that I had. I really appreciated the fans following us every single time. The team we had that year, it was awesome. That’s my GM right there.”

That would be Chris Hall, the former Pride GM and Futures League Commissioner. Garces kicked another teammate out of the bullpen in that final game, telling him to go tell Hobson he was closing things out. He loved playing for Hobson, whom he sees often at Red Sox Fantasy Camps.

“It’s like my Dad in baseball,” he said.

One of the big hitters of the 2007 title team, Bryan Duplissie, was also on hand.

“The group of guys that we had, it was just a special thing with all of us,” Duplissie said. “We started slow, and then it all came together and we made that run in the end.”

That was Hobson’s last year managing the Pride; he then went to manage an Atlantic League team in 2008 and Duplissie followed him there. “It was awesome, I liked it,” Duplissie said. “Good stuff. It was good to see him again.”

Hobson coached at third last night in the first couple of innings, and English – who actually is one of the more important voices in the FCBL as the owner of the Vermont Lake Monsters – was DH for an at-bat and grounded out to third.

Before the game, Hobson was in Silver Knights manager Nick Guarino’s office, telling tons of stories.

“It was a great honor to have him here,” Guarino said. “We talked for a little bit before, for about an hour, in the clubhouse, getting some stories from him, mostly ejection stories.

“It was good to have him. He was coaching out there, he just wasn’t a spectator, he was here trying to talk to guys, making guys better.”

Hobson was coaching at third in the first inning when Silver Knight Cole Patterson, running from third on contact, was caught in a rundown on a comebacker to Worcester pitcher Randy Guzman. When the inning ended, Hobson walked over to the Worcester dugout and told Bravehearts manager Luke Beckstein and a few players “You know, I can tell you’ve worked on that play, because you executed it perfectly.”