Rays at Red Sox (Game 2)
The Boston Red Sox looked great this week while playing against one of the worst teams in baseball, but the Tampa Bay Rays are posing more of a challenge. The Red Sox will try to get a pair of games back against an American League East rival when they host the Rays in a day-night doubleheader on Saturday.
Boston, which is making up a rainout from last month in the nightcap, dropped two of three at AL East-leading New York last weekend before picking itself back up with a sweep of the Kansas City Royals, but fell right off the pace again with a 5-1 loss to the Rays in the opener of the four-game series on Friday. The defending World Series champion Red Sox trail the Yankees by 6 1/2 games and sit six behind the Rays in the East and fell to 4-7 this season against their two main competitors with Friday's setback. Tampa Bay owns the major's best pitching staff and got eight scoreless innings from Yonny Chirinos to begin the series, limiting Boston to four hits while holding red-hot Rafael Devers to 0-for-4 with three strikeouts. The Rays, who yielded a total of two runs during their three-game winning streak, will dig deep into their bag of pitching options for the doubleheader and figure to let Ryan Yarbrough take the bulk of the innings against righty Josh Smith in the opener while spreading out the relievers in a bullpen game versus Boston's David Price in the nightcap.
TV: 6:10 p.m. ET, FS Sun (Tampa Bay), NESN (Boston)
PITCHING MATCHUP: Rays RH Ryne Stanek (0-1, 2.88 ERA) vs. Red Sox LH David Price (3-2, 2.83)
Stanek has made 17 of his 26 appearances as a starter, most recently with two innings against Detroit on Thursday, and could be the first to go in the nightcap. The Rays also recalled multi-inning reliever Casey Sadler from Triple-A Durham prior to Friday's contest and Austin Pruitt will be added as the 26th man. Sadler tossed two scoreless innings against Boston on April 19 and worked at least two innings in each of his seven appearances for Tampa Bay.
Price surrendered three or fewer earned runs in each of his last eight outings and held the New York Yankees to two runs on six hits and a walk in 6 1/3 innings to earn a win on Sunday. The 2012 Cy Young Award winner owns 59 strikeouts in 54 innings while issuing 12 walks. Price, who was drafted No. 1 overall by Tampa Bay in 2007, made back-to-back starts against his former team in April and went 0-1 despite yielding a total of four runs in 11 innings.
WALK-OFFS
1. Red Sox DH J.D. Martinez (back spasms) was held out of the lineup on Friday and is day-to-day.
2. Tampa Bay CF Kevin Kiermaier homered and drover in four runs in the opener.
3. Boston 1B Mitch Moreland (back) came off the 10-day IL on Friday but left after six innings due to quad tightness.