After a long hard fought battle last night and into early this morning, the Boston Red Sox and Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim are back at it again tonight with the Angels looking to force a decisive Game 4 back in Anaheim.
The Red Sox will be looking to their ace of 2008 Jon Lester to prevent a return flight to Anaheim after the game tonight. In Game 1, Lester allowed 1 unearned run on 6 hits and a walk while striking out 7 in 7 innings of work. Lester made 17 regular season starts at Fenway Park and was 11-1 with a 2.49 ERA.
John Lackey looks to keep the Angels alive tonight. In Game 1, he gave up 2 runs on 4 hits and 3 walks in 6 2/3 innings of work to take the loss in the Red Sox 4-1 victory. Lackey is 2-4 with a 6.34 ERA in his lifetime at Fenway Park.
The new big news of the night is the fact that Mike Lowell is not in the lineup and could be done for the playoffs.
He’s really sore. He came out of the game last night and was really sore. Checked on him today. The trainers checked on him this morning, and we knew that he was sore. He came in. He’s pretty beat up. He’s not in the lineup tonight. Where it goes from here, we don’t know yet. He needs to be seen by the doctors. I think he’s a little frustrated. Nobody questions his toughness. It’s just getting difficult for him to be a baseball player right now. We’re going to try to get this out. Get a little more information on what we should do, or what we can do, or what we’re able to do.
Here is the transcript for press conferences of Terry Francona as well as Mike Scioscia.
Adam Kilgore of the Boston Globe gets us up-to-date with the rest of the Red Sox pregame news.
Tony Massarotti of the Boston Globe previews Game 4.
Amalie Benjamin of the Boston Globe stopped by for a chat this morning over at Boston.com.
Dan over at Red Sox Monster has an interview with the guy who bought Big Papi’s bed in the auction.
Lineups and batter/pitcher matchups after the jump.
1-2
1. Chone Figgins, 3B
2. Garret Anderson, LF
3. Mark Teixeira, 1B
4. Vladimir Guerrero, DH
5. Torii Hunter, CF
6. Mike Napoli, C
7. Juan Rivera, RF
8. Howie Kendrick, 2B
9. Erick Aybar, SS
– John Lackey, SP
2-1
1. Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
2. Dustin Pedroia, 2B
3. David Ortiz, DH
4. Kevin Youkilis, 3B
5. J.D. Drew, RF
6. Jason Bay, LF
7. Mark Kotsay, 1B
8. Jed Lowrie, SS
9. Jason Varitek, C
– Jon Lester, SP
And here is how the hitters have fared in the regular season in their careers against tonight’s starting pitchers.
And here is how the hitters have fared against tonight’s starting pitchers in the playoffs courtesy of Baseball Reference.
