The Boston Red Sox have started to build a nice lead in the AL East standings after a nice stretch, including six straight wins as of Wednesday. The Sox offense is picking up and the pitching is starting to solidify as we head into the final series before the All-Star break. The Boston All-Stars won’t have far to go to get to Miami after their four-game weekend series in St. Petersburg against the Tampa Bay Rays.
This series will be contested from Thursday, July 6, 2017 through Sunday, July 9, 2017 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. MLB Network will carry Thursday’s game for those watching outside the local viewing areas.
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Pitching Matchups
Year after year, the Rays keep finding stud pitchers. They seem to be able to develop young arms as well as any team. The latest example of that is Jacob Faria. He starts for them on Thursday.
Faria has made five starts at for Tampa Bay, going 3-0 with a 2.23 ERA and 0.897 WHIP in 32.1 innings. He’s struck out 35.
Even in the minors, Faria has been a big strikeout pitcher. He’s average 9.4 strikeouts per nine innings over his seven year professional career. His stuff has consistently allowed him to perform in the minors, his command became a question as he progressed to the higher levels.
He walked 4.1 batters per nine innings split between Double-A and Triple-A last year. Before his promotion his walk rate was down to 3.4 in Triple-A Durham and he was 6-1 with a 3.07 ERA.
Faria has been impressive so far, but he’ll face his biggest challenge to date on Thursday. He goes against a hot Sox team who will counter with Chris Sale.
Sale is 11-3 with a 2.61 ERA and 0.895 WHIP in 120.2 innings. He leads the league in strikeouts, FIP, WHIP and hits allowed per nine.
In two games against Sale already, Tampa Bay has scratched out four runs in 14 innings. They have hit a couple homers, but have also been set down on strikes 24 times.
The rest of the series features what the Rays call veterans with Jake Odorizzi, Alex Cobb and Chris Archer lined up to pitch Friday through Sunday. Boston has Drew Pomeranz, Rick Porcello and David Price lined up for those three contests.
Odorizzi, Cobb and Archer are the Rays’ top three starters based on innings, each making at least 15 starts. They also have ERAs within nearly a tenth of a run of each other. Archer’s tops in the group at 3.95, Odorizzi is last at 4.08.
The FIPs of these pitchers varies much more considerably. Archer seems to be underperforming his FIP which is at 3.02 due to his reasonably low homer run and walk rates along with his 10.8 strikeouts per nine innings.
Neither Cobb nor Odorizzi have shown to be big strikeout guys this year, but Cobb has been better with the long balls and free passes. For Odorizzi, the home run has been a real issue and while the Sox haven’t been a huge power team all year, their power has been picking up of late. He’s allowed 18 homers in 15 starts and has a 3.1 walk per nine inning ratio as well.
On the Red Sox side of things, Porcello has been more of the 2015 version rather than the 2016 version. He’s 4-10 with a 5.01 ERA. Between him and Cobb, the Rays may have the upper-hand—at least on the bump—on Saturday.
Pomeranz, meanwhile, is throwing the ball really well and Price is coming off a very strong outing.
The former is now 8-4 with a 3.64 ERA, he’s struck out 92 batters in 84 innings and has allowed just four runs in 23.2 innings over his last four starts.
Price is 4-2 with a 4.02 ERA in eight starts. He threw six shutout innings against the Rangers in his last start, striking out nine. That was on the heels of back-to-back quality starts. Perhaps, the rust if now gone for Price.
Offensive Comparison
The biggest criticism of the Rays the last several years has been about a lackluster offense behind a strong rotation.
The offense is much stronger here in 2017. They’re fifth in the AL in runs scored and have hit the third most home runs in baseball.
Tampa Bay is getting on base at a solid .330 clip, too, while also hitting .257. It’s not just the homers, but strikeouts are high and power is key.
Logan Morrison is having a big year for the Rays. He’s slugged 24 homers. Steven Souza, Corey Dickerson, Evan Longoria and Tim Beckham have all provided at least 11 long ball so the power comes from up-and-down the order. With Wilson Ramos now behind the plate in place of Derek Norris, even more power is possible.
For Boston, the homer run ball hasn’t been a big storyline, until recently. They’ve only hit 86 this year, but have six in July and have scored 40 runs in their last four games.
Andrew Benintendi hit a couple homers in a five hit game on Tuesday. Mookie Betts had a monster game before that with a couple homers of his own. There are five Sox players with 11 or more bombs, but Betts leads the way with 15.
Overall, the Sox have been able to score runs a number of different ways, but with the power coming around, that makes them even more difficult as they look to open up a big lead in the division.
Defensive Difference
The Red Sox have nine fewer errors than the Rays. Tampa Bay is not the same Rays team we’re used to seeing.
Tampa used to pride itself on starting pitching and defense. Now, the starting pitching is still pretty solid top-to-bottom, but the defense ranks No. 27 in baseball with its 61 errors made.
The Rays still seem to be getting to more balls than most with 2,283 put outs, but there are certainly more holes in the defense than in years past. Injuries play a role, but so do priorities and right now, power has the edge.
When it comes to defending the lead late, the Sox have the edge there, too. Boston’s bullpen has the third best ERA in the game behind Cleveland and Los Angeles. The Rays aren’t bad, but they rank No. 20.
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