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Roger Mooney

Roger Mooney covers the Tampa Bay Rays for The Tampa Tribune, TBO.com and News Channel 8. He has covered the Rays since their first season in 1998, including 11 years for the Bradenton Herald. Roger has also covered Florida, South Florida and Florida State football, the Bucs and the Lightning.

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Fenway Park awaits slumping Rays

Posted Jun 29, 2010 by Roger Mooney

Updated Jun 29, 2010 at 10:33 AM

The Rays will find a different Red Sox team than the one they beat 8-2 on April 19 during their last game at Fenway Park, which was Patriot’s Day in New England.

ROGER MOONEY
BOSTON While the standings say the Rays are very much in the push for a playoff spot, their play since May 24 suggests otherwise.

If not for the white hot start, the Rays would find themselves clawing just get back into the race.

Instead, the third place Rays have a golden opportunity to move up the standing with this two games series against the second place Red Sox that begins tonight at Fenway Park.

The Rays catch a break in that Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia (fracture in left foot) and catcher Victor Martinez (fractured tip of left thumb) won’t be in the lineup.

With Jason Varitek behind the plate, the Rays can turn this quick series into the Penn Relays, providing they get on base.

Yet, that has been a chore of late.

The Rays managed only seven hits over the weekend in the three game series with the Diamondbacks and none of those hits came Friday night against former Ray Edwin Jackson, who tossed the first no-hitter at Tropicana Field.

These teams were separated by 8 1/2 games in the standings May 24 when they began a three-game series at the Trop, which the Red Sox swept.

Since then, the Red Sox are 22-11 and the Rays are 12-19.

James Shields, 0-3 with a 9.37 ERA in his last three starts, faces John Lackey, who is 8-3 overall with a 4.69 ERA.

Shields historically has not pitched well at Fenway Park, yet he did win his last start here when he allowed four runs in 6 2/3 innings in the Rays 6-5 win.

The game, played on a cold, rainy April night, followed the conclusion of the game suspended from Friday night.

Shields won the second game of the Rays four-game sweep that helped push the Rays to a historically fast start and gave them the best record in baseball 932-12) on May 23.

Then the Red Sox came to town …

While the Red Sox will be without Pedroia and Martinez, we won’t know until this afternoon if left fielder Carl Crawford’s strained left shoulder will permit him to be in the lineup and if manager Joe Maddon is taking any action against center fielder B.J. Upton, whose lack of hustle Sunday on a ball in the gap led to a dugout confrontation with third baseman Evan Longoria.

We do know this: tonight starts the stretch of nine games against the Red Sox (five games) and Twins.

With six of those games on the road, that’s a tough stretch for any team, especially one that is struggling.