{"id":16110,"date":"2011-06-15T13:26:03","date_gmt":"2011-06-15T18:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=16110"},"modified":"2011-06-15T13:26:03","modified_gmt":"2011-06-15T18:26:03","slug":"al-east-rivalry-boston-red-sox-travel-to-tampa-bay-to-take-on-rays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/al-east-rivalry-boston-red-sox-travel-to-tampa-bay-to-take-on-rays-16110\/","title":{"rendered":"AL East Rivalry: Boston Red Sox Travel To Tampa Bay to take on Rays"},"content":{"rendered":"

Boston Red Sox (39-27) AT Tampa Bay Rays (36-31)<\/strong>
\nJune 15, 2011 at 7:10 PM EST<\/strong>
\nOpening Moneyline:\u00a0 BOS -140, TAM +120<\/strong>
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 BOS -129, TAM +109<\/strong>
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 8<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 7.5<\/strong><\/p>\n

SP: BOS- Josh Beckett; TAM- Jeremy Hellickson<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Jeremy Hellickson has impressed so far<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It’s early in the season, but so far, it appears Boston is ready to reclaim the AL East as they currently hold a 3.5 game lead over third place Tampa Bay, and a 1.5 game lead over the Yankees, in perhaps the toughest division in baseball.<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay’s players know it is a long season and that anything can happen still, and they are riding a three game winnings streak.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, we are the defending American League East champs and we plan on defending it, recapturing the flag again,\u201d manager Joe Maddon said. \u201cDon\u2019t let anybody think anything differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

Going against the Red Sox’ Josh Beckett may not help extend the streak, however.\u00a0 He has a 2.06 ERA and has won 5 of 7 decisions.\u00a0 In his last 7 starts, he has gone 3-1 with a 1.81 ERA.\u00a0 Thursday of last week against the Yankees, he held them to 2 runs and 4 hits over 7 innings in yet another quality start.\u00a0 He has also owned the Rays in his last two meetings, going 1-0 while allowing only 2 runs in 12 innings, while striking out 12 batters.<\/p>\n

For as much as the Rays may struggle with Beckett’s bag of tricks, Hellickson may experience similar success given that the Red Sox are batting .211 in the three meetings against Tampa Bay and they hit only 5 singles on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s no secret that they have a good offense. They got a lot of really professional hitters, and they know what they are doing up there,\u201d starting pitcher Jeremy Hellickson said.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019ve got speed and power. They are seeing the ball well right now and scoring a lot of runs, but we\u2019re up for the challenge.”<\/p>\n

Hellickson, a rookie, had a tough outing on Friday in Baltimore.\u00a0 He gave up 5 runs and 7 hits in 5 2\/3rds innings, while receiving no run support at all.\u00a0 Prior to that loss he had won 6 of his 7 previous starts, a stint over which he recorded a 1.74 ERA.\u00a0 It’s good that he has been effective in light of the fact that the Rays got rid of an effective pitcher (Matt Garza) to clear way for Hellickson, whose fastball can touch 95 and he has great control over his pitches as well.\u00a0 Last year, in only 26 innings of work at the major league level, he struck out 33.<\/p>\n

Some betting trends:<\/p>\n

The total has gone OVER in 10 of Boston’s last 13 games and the Red Sox are 6-1 SU In their last 7 games on the road.\u00a0 The total has gone OVER in 4 of their last 6 games on the road and it has gone OVER in 4 of their last 6 against Tampa Bay.\u00a0 The Red Sox are 1-4 SU in their last 5 against Tampa Bay and they are 1-6 SU in their last 7 road games in Tampa.\u00a0 The total has gone UNDER in 5 of their last 6 on the road in Tampa.<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay is 6-2 SU in their last 8 games and the total has gone UNDER in 17 of their last 25 at home.\u00a0 The Rays are 4-1 SU in their last 5 against Boston and the total has gone OVER in 4 of Tampa Bay’s last 6 games against the Red Sox.\u00a0 The total has gone UNDER in 5 of the Rays’ last 6 games at home against the Red Sox and the Rays are 6-1 SU In their last 7 games at home against the Boston Red Sox.<\/p>\n

The total seems peculiarly high for two pitchers that have been so effective.\u00a0 It’s not like 8 runs is really a lot, but Beckett hasn’t allowed much and Hellickson had been rather stingy too despite a poor showing in his last start.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boston Red Sox (39-27) AT Tampa Bay Rays (36-31) June 15, 2011 at 7:10 PM EST Opening Moneyline:\u00a0 BOS -140, TAM +120 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 BOS -129, TAM +109 Opening Total:\u00a0 8 Current Total:\u00a0 7.5 SP: BOS- Josh Beckett; TAM- Jeremy Hellickson It’s early in the season, but so far, it appears Boston is ready to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":15622,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[69,150],"class_list":["post-16110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-boston-red-sox","tag-tampa-bay-rays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16110"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16110\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16112,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16110\/revisions\/16112"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}