Boston @ Tampa Bay preview
Tropicana Field
Last Meeting ( Jul 6, 2010 ) Boston 2, Tampa Bay 3
The Boston Red Sox can't get to the All-Star break soon enough.
A 3-2 loss to the Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday night was the third straight defeat for the Red Sox, who dropped 3 1/2 games behind the American League East-leading New York Yankees.
The resurgent Rays, winners of six of their last seven games, also have moved 1 1/2 games in front of Boston and are two behind the Yankees.
They go for a sweep of their three-game series with ace David Price on the mound Wednesday night.
With injuries piling up on an almost daily basis and 11 players currently on the disabled list, the Red Sox continually have been forced to trot out a patchwork lineup - and the cracks are beginning to show in the foundation.
First baseman Kevin Youkilis became the latest of Boston's walking wounded when he was forced to leave Tuesday's game against Tampa Bay with what was described as right ankle pain.
The injury thrust Niuman Romero, a recent call-up from Triple-A Pawtucket, into the lineup Tuesday.
Rays manager Joe Maddon wasted no time exploiting Youkilis' absence, intentionally walking David Ortiz three times to get to Romero, who failed to come through on all three occasions and stranded six runners on base.
The fact that Red Sox manager Terry Francona allowed Romero to bat again with two out and two on in the ninth speaks to the plight of Boston, which had four players in Tuesday’s game that weren’t on the roster one month ago.
Youkilis said he wants to play in today’s game, but taking his batting .297 batting average, 17 home runs and 55 RBIs out of middle out of order just makes the matchup against Price much more daunting.
Price (11-4) is tied for the American League lead in wins and is second in ERA with a dazzling 2.42 mark. The hard-throwing lefty absorbed the loss in his last outing despite allowing just two runs on four hits in eight innings of a 2-1 defeat at Minnesota.
He is 1-1 in two career starts vs. Boston (both in 2009), having been hurt by allowing three homers in 11 1/3 innings.
Carl Crawford homered, giving him four hits in the series, and Sean Rodriguez tripled and scored a run to extend his hitting streak to eight games in Tuesday’s victory.
Red Sox starter Tim Wakefield (3-6) has treated the Rays like punching bags for most of his career, but Tampa Bay has started to turn the tide against the 43-year-old right-hander of late.
While Wakefield still owns a spectacular 20-5 career mark against Tampa Bay, the Rays beat the knuckleballer four times in 2008 and lost the only time they faced him last year.
Wakefield is coming off one of his better outings of the season, limiting Baltimore to two runs and seven hits in eight innings of a 3-2 Boston victory last Friday.