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<\/a>Boston begins life after the All-Star break atop the AL East standings and enters today\u2019s game on a six-game win streak.\u00a0 The Red Sox have come a long way from starting the year with an 0-6 record.\u00a0 \u201cIt was a very difficult start.\u00a0 There\u2019s no getting around that,\u201d said Red Sox manager Terry Francona.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re not done yet, not even close, but we\u2019re playing better baseball.\u201d\u00a0 The club has certainly done just that by winning 25 of its last 34 games, outscoring opponents by an incredible 215-126 margin.\u00a0 Offensively, All-Star first baseman Adrian Gonzalez continues to prove his worth, tied for the major league lead with a .354 batting average.\u00a0 Boston is 22-6 in its last 28 games versus divisional foes.<\/p>\n
Red Sox starting pitcher Andrew Miller is seeking to keep his perfect season going and much of his success can be attributed to run support.\u00a0 Boston\u2019s offense has provided the 26-year-old with an amazing 38 runs in his four starts, leading to his 3-0 mark and 3.57 ERA.\u00a0 Miller is a perfect 2-0 with a 2.25 ERA in two road outings, surrendering just a single home run in 12 frames.\u00a0 He has tallied a 5-4 record and 5.57 ERA in 13 career outings in July.\u00a0 The former first-round selection will be facing the Rays for the second time in his career, allowing five runs and eight hits over 6 1\/3 innings of a 5-2 defeat on June 28, 2009.<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay has won three of the first five meetings in this high-profile series and will be looking to cut into Boston\u2019s six-game lead over them in the standings.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re playing pretty good ball,\u201d said Rays third baseman Evan Longoria.\u00a0 \u201cPretty fundamentally sound.\u201d\u00a0 The Rays will need to turn things around at home, entering with an even 21-21 mark at Tropicana Field, while possessing the league\u2019s second-best road record.\u00a0 Tonight\u2019s opponent has played the team tough in St. Petersburgh, as Tampa has dropped six of its last nine versus Boston at Tropicana Field.\u00a0 The Rays have also faltered mightily on this particular day of the week, posting an 11-24 mark on Fridays.<\/p>\n
Rays starting pitcher David Price is winless in his first two starts this month and comes in with a 8-7 record and 3.70 ERA in 19 starts.\u00a0 The left-hander picked up a no-decision last time out in the Bronx versus the Yankees, giving up four runs and seven hits, including New York shortstop Derek Jeter\u2019s landmark 3,000th hit.\u00a0 Price has tallied a losing 3-4 mark and 3.26 ERA in nine home starts, but has issued just 14 walks and registered 72 strikeouts in 60 2\/3 innings.\u00a0 In seven previous starts versus the Red Sox, he is 4-3 with a 3.43 ERA, but was handed a 4-2 defeat at Tropicana Field against Boston on June 16.<\/p>\n
Bettors will likely back the Red Sox due to their 21-7 record on the road, while the Rays are 1-4 in their last five games within the division<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays open up a critical three-game series in the American League East Friday night at Tropicana Field Boston Red Sox at Tampa Bay Rays Boston begins life after the All-Star break atop the AL East standings and enters today\u2019s game on a six-game win streak.\u00a0 The Red Sox […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":15628,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[998,5065,69,397,1981,150,1574],"class_list":["post-16436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-adrian-gonzalez","tag-andrew-miller","tag-boston-red-sox","tag-david-price","tag-evan-longoria","tag-tampa-bay-rays","tag-tropicana-field"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16436","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\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16436"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16436\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16443,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16436\/revisions\/16443"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}