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To me, spring training is much akin to a certain genre of television wrestling that’s largely bygone but has made a comeback recently with AEW Dark. It’s low-stress, non-essential viewing that you can turn on in the background. It makes for excellent background noise while you’re doing actual work, like writing lineup posts for instance. There’s nothing essential about this SCU vs. Sydal Brothers match on my television, but hearing Excalibur and Taz banter about nothing comforts me much in the same way that seeing the Sox in their navy blue spring unis. This is the honeymoon phase of spring training. Baseball can do nothing wrong this early in the year. But before long we’re going to grow tired of watching spring ball, wanting the real thing to finally show up. So let’s enjoy the honeymoon phase while we can.
As for the actual game, we have Nick Pivetta taking the bump against young ace José Berríos, with seven of nine lineup spots for the Red Sox including projected regulars (or something close), plus an old friend at the bottom of Minnesota’s lineup. First pitch is at 1:05. NESN isn’t broadcasting today, but the Twins network is so if you have MLB.tv you can watch there. Should be fun!
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Red Sox
1. Enrique Hernández, SS
2. Marwin Gonzalez, 2B
3. J.D. Martinez, DH
4. Rafael Devers, 3B
5. Hunter Renfroe, RF
6. Christian Vázquez, C
7. Bobby Dalbec, 1B
8. César Puello, LF
9. Michael Gettys, CF
SP: Nick Pivetta, RHP
Twins
1. Luis Arraez, 2B
2. Mitch Garver, C
3. Nelson Cruz, DH
4. Jake Cave, CF
5. Kyle Garlick, LF
6. Brent Rooker, RF
7. Andrew Romine, SS
8. Tzu-Wei Lin, 3B
9. Aaron Sabato, 1B
SP: José Berríos, RHP