Red Sox 07 Game 65

Thursday, June 14               Fenway Park  7:05 PM ET
Jeff Francis, LHP (5-5, 3.81)
Rockies (31-33)

       Vs.

Josh Beckett, RHP (9-0, 2.88)
Red Sox (41-22)

American League

East	W	L	GB	L 10	X W	X L
Boston	41	23	-	4-6	39	25
New York	32	31	8.5	9-1	37	26
Toronto	31	34	10.5	5-5	33	32
Tampa Bay	29	34	11.5	7-3	26	37
Baltimore	29	36	12.5	2-8	32	33

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From MLB.Com Scouting Report

Rockies: Francis wasn't at his sharpest on Friday night in Baltimore, but he pitched well for most of his seven innings, yielding four runs on seven hits and a walk while striking out six. He gave up a pair of two-out runs on three hits and a walk in the first, but he was most upset about a mental mistake in the fifth. He didn't have a feel for his changeup against left-handers, but gambled on fooling Nick Markakis with one on and two out. Markakis won the bet, sending the hanging changeup over the out-of-town scoreboard for the decisive blow in a 4-2 loss.

Red Sox: Beckett continues to be locked in. In his previous outing, at Arizona, he went eight innings, allowed two runs and struck out eight to earn his ninth win in 11 starts this season. Beckett is holding the opposition to a .211 batting average. He's 5-0 at Fenway with a 3.48 ERA. Lifetime against the Rockies, Beckett is 4-0 with a 2.81 ERA.

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	H	2b	3b	HR's	RBI	BB's	K's	BA
D. Pedroia	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
K. Youkilis	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
D. Ortiz	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
M. Ramirez	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
J.D. Drew	7	3	0	0	0	0	0	0	.429
M. Lowell	3	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
J. Varitek	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	.000
C. Crisp	4	1	1	0	0	2	0	0	.250
J. Lugo	3	1	0	0	0	0	0	1	.333
Totals	17	5	1	0	0	2	0	1	.294

The entire team has faced Francis 20 times, with Drew and Crisp having 11 AB's. That does not excite me very much, since it seems to be a given that the Sox struggle against pitchers that they haven't faced much. Still we are talking about a pitcher only 5 games over .500 in his career, oops, thats right hes a freaking lefty. Which will win? The Beckett run support or the we suck against lefties who stink syndrome.

Josh, you better have your game face on tonight.

Historical Pitching line

Pitcher	GS	W	L	Sho	IP	H	ER	HR	BB	K	ERA	WHIP
Francis	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Beckett	5	4	0	0	32	31	10	2	9	23	2.81	1.25

Francis has never started a game or appeared in a game vs the Red Sox. Not to worry, he's a freaking lefty so that means the Sox will make him look like Cy "freaking" Young. I expect Drew to suck, Varitek to suck, Lugo to suck and everybody else in the line up to suck. 7.5 games back here we come.

Chow!