Thursday, September 15, 2011

Red Sox vs. Rays (September 15, 2011)

Tampa Bay Rays (82-66) at Red Sox (86-62)

SP - Kyle Weiland (0-1, 6.75) vs. Jeremy Hellickson (12-10, 2.96)

1. Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
2. Dustin Pedroia, 2B
3. Adrian Gonzalez, 1B
4. David Ortiz, DH
5. Kevin Youkilis, 3B
6. Josh Reddick, RF
7. Carl Crawford, LF
8. Jarrod Saltalamacchia, C
9. Marco Scutaro, SS

Three Strikes:

1. It's good to see both Adrian Gonzalez (left calf) and David Ortiz (back spasms) back in the Red Sox lineup as they open a critical four game series with the Rays at Fenway Park tonight.

With Kyle Weiland (tonight) and Tim Wakefield (Sunday) on the bump for two of the games - Josh Beckett and Jon Lester will pitch in the other two games -the Red Sox offense needs to get rocking this series.  The Red Sox have a 4 game lead over the Rays (and 4.5 games over the Angels) for the Wild Card so this series will probably determine a playoff spot.  Boston needs to take at least two games and if they take three out of four they would have a commanding five game lead over Tampa Bay with ten games left.

2. Jacoby Ellsbury, Red Sox MVP.

3. Alfredo Aceves or Jarrod Saltalamacchia for 10th Player?  Can't go wrong with either.

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