The Sox play their final three games on the West Coast this weekend, as they face the Seattle Mariners in a three-game series. After this, it's no more than one hour westward for the Sox—so that means no hugely late nights after this! Hooray for less Sox-induced insomnia!
OK. Since there's a baseball game going on, that implies some pitching is going to be happening. Seattle offers up Blake Beavan, who represents exactly the kind of young upstart that has a tendency to give what is normally a potent Sox offense fits all night long.
See what I mean? The Sox can't even find out what he looks like unless they, you know, watch some game footage!
Facing Beavan tonight is John Lackey who, barring the recent start against Cleveland, has ben quite serviceable as of late. (Even if he isn't setting the world on fire, at least by and large he's not setting the team's chances of winning on fire. Hmm, fire. Barebcue. Grilled meats. Mmmmmm.)
Oops, never mind. Here's Lackey's line for the year. Try not to wince too sharply; wouldn't want you to pull any muscles while reading this.
Now, presumably there will be some sort of actual lineup facing the Mariners' pitching staff. The same can't quite be said for the Mariners' lineup. In fact, perhaps the less said, the better. Well, okay, probably worth pointing out a few items. The Mariners are to the bottom of the offensive standings what the Red Sox are to the top of the standings. The Mariners currently rank: last in runs scored, RBI, hits, OBP and SLG. They're only next to last in 2B's and HR's. And if we want to talk OPS, let's put it this way: the only Sox with OPS's lower than Seattle's team average are JD Drew and the pitching staff. (And Drew's under by less than 0.01, which I'd call close enough to be noise.) So, yeah, this is pretty much a dead offense walking. So their epic seventeen-game losing streak earlier this year doesn't come as too much of a surprise, when you're fielding statistically the worst offense in the league by a mile.
So, yes, even though this is a road trip, we want wins. Let's look to these guys to get the party started:
Ellsbury, CF
Pedroia, 2B
Gonzalez, 1B
Youkilis, 3B
Ortiz, DH
Crawford, LF
Saltalamacchia, C
Reddick, RF
Scutaro, SS
Go Sox!