Red Sox 07 Game 54

 Saturday, June 2     Fenway Park |  3:55 PM ET
Mike Mussina, RHP (2-3, 5.86) Yankees (23-29)


          @


Curt Schilling, RHP (5-2, 3.68) Red Sox (36-17) 

AL East Standings

Team	W	L	GB	L 10	X W	X L
Boston	36	17	-	6-4	34	19
Baltimore	27	28	10.0	7-3	29	26
Toronto	25	29	11.5	5-5	26	28
New York	23	29	12.5	4-6	29	23
Tampa Bay	22	30	13.5	4-6	20	32

ESPN.Com preview should be here.
Yahoo's preview should be here.
The recap after the game will be here.

From MLB.Com Scouting Report

Yankees: Mussina gave the Yankees a vintage performance in his last effort, pitching into the seventh inning of his Sunday start against the Angels, but the bullpen couldn't hold the lead and cost Mussina what would have been his third victory of the year. Having rebounded from a terrible start against the Red Sox on May 22 -- allowing seven runs and 10 hits over 6 2/3 innings in the Bronx -- Mussina gets a chance to get back at Boston with this start.

Red Sox: Schilling returned to form in his last start, registering a season-high of 10 strikeouts against the Indians. The right-hander went seven innings while walking none and allowing one run and getting the win. Schilling is 0-1 with a 6.92 ERA in two starts against the Yankees this season. At Fenway, Schilling is 2-0 with a 3.12 ERA in six starts.

As usual all statistics were found at the day by day database at Baseball Musings and this year at Baseball Reference.

Expected Batters vs opposing starter

Player	AB	Hits	2b	3b	HR's	RBI	BB's	K's	BA
J. Lugo	27	7	2	0	1	4	0	4	.259
K. Youkilis	13	4	1	0	0	2	0	2	.308
D. Ortiz	42	13	0	0	3	7	5	19	.310
M. Ramirez	93	23	4	1	6	18	7	20	.247
J.D. Drew	7	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
M. Lowell	17	9	2	0	2	6	0	1	.529
J. Varitek	57	7	0	0	0	1	4	25	.123
C. Crisp	23	8	3	0	0	1	0	6	.348
D. Pedroia	5	1	0	0	0	0	0	1	.200
A. Cora	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
D. Mirabelli	14	6	1	0	2	4	1	3	.429
E. Hinske	29	4	0	0	0	1	5	12	.138
W. Pena	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
All Players	331	82	13	1	14	44	22	94	.248
Starters	284	72	12	1	12	39	16	79	.254
Bench	47	10	1	0	2	5	6	15	.213

I really don't know what the status of Lowell and J.D. Drew will be today. My feeling is that Lowell will play or at least try to play and J.D. Drew will sit for Eric Hinske. I Lowell sits, I think you will see Cora at third and Hinske in right field. Its too bad that Tito won't play Mirabelli since he owns Mussina, but I just don't see Francona sitting Varitek, no matter what the numbers are, especially with this being a day game after a night game in which Mirabelli sucked.

Historical Pitching line over all

Pitcher	GS	W	L	Sho	IP	H	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
Mussina	51	19	15	2	344	327	137	36	90	297	3.58	1.21
Schilling	16	4	7	0	110 1/3	111	58	22	30	94	4.73	1.28

As you can tell Mussina has a pretty good record against the Sox. Much better than Schilling has against the Yankees thats for sure. Since 2005 though Mussina is 2 and 3 against the Sox with a 6.39 ERA in 9 starts (49.1 IP). So, the trend is good.

Schilling during the same time period has made 9 starts and is 4 and 4 with a 4.74 ERA in 62.2 IP. That includes two relief appearances at Fenway in 2005 in which he suffered one loss on two home runs and two earned runs in 2.0 IP. Remove those relief appearances and his ERA drops to 4.60 with a 1.20 WHIP.

Historical Pitching at Fenway

Pitcher	GS	W	L	Sho	IP	H	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
Mussina	24	24	7	2	159	149	63	11	43	142	3.57	1.21
Schilling	8	4	2	0	54 1/3	55	27	8	14	45	4.47	1.27

Historically the two match up better at Fenway even though Schillings numbers reflect the relief appearances that I mentioned above in this post. The last time that Schilling won at Fenway was on 5/22/2006 when he won his 199th game. He went 8 innings in that game giving up only 1 run. In two starts at Fenway since then he has pitched 14 innings with a 5.14 ERA and a WHIP of 1.14. The 5/22 game was his last decision vs the Yankees at Fenway.

Mussina's last win at Fenway was on 8/28/2002. He pitched a 3 hit shut out in that game. Since then in six starts he has gone 33 2/3 innings with a 5.88 ERA and a WHIP of 1.72 with an 0-2 record. Only one of those games would be considered a quality start (9/24/2004). His last start on 8/20/2006 he only went 4 innings (his shortest of the 6 starts).

Chow!