Red Sox vs. Twins lineups: Green day

The Red Sox and Twins face off for what feels like 126th time this March at 1:05 p.m. in Fort Myers behind Eduardo Rodriguez, but, unlike the previous times, the Sox will be wearing green for St. Patrick’s Day—another sign that the regular season is creeping nearer and nearer. There is no TV broadcast for this game.

Another sign that the “real games” approacheth is the site of Xander Bogaerts back in the field. Bogaerts will make his first appearance of spring at shortstop, rounding out a lineup card that looks suspiciously like one we might see at or around opening day. In other positive news, I got added to the Red Sox’s pre-game notes list, which means I can tell you the Sox have had a single player (Jimmy Walsh, from 1916-1917) and manager (Patsy Donovan, from 1910-11) from the Emerald Isle, Donovan just after a stretch managing the Brooklyn Superbas. And now you know.

E-Rod continues he rebound from his nightmarish 2020 off the field, leading Matt Collins of Over the Monster (that’s us!) to wonder if he can get back in the habit of pounding the strike zone as he did in his breakout 2019:

As soon as he stopped nibbling and started to take out his frustrations on the strike zone, he started to put up better numbers than ever before. His strikeout rate actually did fall a bit, but the Red Sox will take that trade off for more innings and fewer runs every day of the week. And on top of that, deeper outings at the top of the rotation saves the bullpen for the rest of the rotation, which is full of pitchers who have has plenty of questions of their own.

Rodriguez will be followed by strikeout machine Darwinzon Hernandez, Austin Brice and Kevin “not the politician” McCarthy. The Twins will start Matt Shoemaker and follow him with Alex Colomé, among others. Sláinte, friends!

Twins lineup

1. Luis Arráez, 2B

2. Josh Donaldson, 3B

3. Nelson Cruz, DH

4. Byron Buxton, CF

5. Jake Cave, LF

6. Alex Kirilloff, 1B

7. Ryan Jeffers, C

8. Willians Astudillo, RF

9. J.T. Riddle, SS

SP: Matt Shoemaker, RHP

Red Sox lineup

1. Kiké Hernández, SS

2. Alex Verdugo, CF

3. J.D. Martinez, DH

4. Xander Bogaerts, SS

5. Rafael Devers, 3B

6. Hunter Renfroe, RF

7. Marwin Gonzalez, LF

8. Christian Vázquez, C

9. Bobby Dalbec, 1B

SP: Eduardo Rodriguez, LHP