Red Sox at Rays Lineups: A hangover lineup without the hangover

A hangover lineup, in case you’re not familiar, is the lineup a team rolls out after clinching a division title, a playoff berth, or both. Basically, it is the day after a long team celebration and a manager gives his top players a day off to recuperate, resulting in often-hilarious lineups. The Red Sox, as you may have guessed, probably didn’t do much celebrating last night after a second consecutive extra-inning loss in just the latest in what has been an absurdly frustrating season. Despite that, they have what certainly resembles something of a hangover lineup.

Granted, that’s not an entirely accurate lineup as three of the team’s four best players are in this lineup. Rafael Devers, Xander Bogaerts and J.D. Martinez do still make up the 2-3-4 stretch on Sunday in Tampa Bay. The rest, though, is pretty hilarious. Jackie Bradley Jr. is in center field like usual, and he’s also leading off. Sam Travis is in left. Christian Vázquez is at first. Gorkys Hernández is in right. Chris Owings is at second. Juan Centeno is behind the plate. Can you feel the excitement?

Now, to be fair they are facing a lefty in Ryan Yarbrough and are loading up with right-handed bats, but this is still pretty wild. The Red Sox are under no obligation to help out teams like the Indians who are battling Tampa Bay for a playoff spot, but I think it’d still be nice to put out the most competitive lineup in these kinds of situations. Of course, the Red Sox are totally going to win this game because baseball is the stupidest.

The full lineups are below.