Royals-reject Kyle Snyder (1-1, 10.03) starts the West Coast trip on the hill for the Red Sox. Against him will be unlucky Jamie Moyer (5-8, 3.75), a pitcher who hasn't had much run support this season (makes you think how good he'd be in a Red Sox uniform).
Moyer gave up a season-high three home runs in his last start versus the Blue Jays. He went 6.1 innings and gave up six runs. Snyder is coming off a 4.2 inning effort against the A's where he gave up five earned runs but struck out six.
Moyer will dread facing Manny Ramirez tonight. Manny has nine career home runs off the lefty and a .340 average over his career. Even David Ortiz, who struggles versus lefties, has four home runs and a .353 average against Moyer.
Here's something new: Ortiz is playing first base tonight and it's not interleague play. Sounds like Terry Francona finally trusts the big guy with the glove. The Red Sox lineup:
Youkilis 3b
Loretta 2b
Ortiz 1b
Ramirez dh
Varitek c
Nixon rf
Crisp cf
Kapler lf
Gonzalez ss
Personally, I'd rather see more of Wily Mo Pena, but Francona elected to stick Kapler out in left field. Better defense, yes, but I think Pena needs to get more at-bats.
Gordon Edes is saying that Kason Gabbard has yet to be activated because Theo might have something up his sleeve -- other than Gabbard -- for tomorrow's game. Jake Peavy? That'd be lovely, but not possible since he's pitching tonight (or he's supposed pitch tonight).