Tonight, Blake Snell and the Rays aim to avoid their fourth consecutive loss as they close out a three-game set at Tropicana Field against the Boston Red Sox.
Boston will send Rick Porcello to the mound, who’ll be looking to build off his stellar start (more on that later) to the 2018 campaign. A Red Sox win would put them 20 games over .500 (35-15 - a remarkable achievement through the season’s first 50 games).
Today’s game will be televised on Fox Sports Sun with the first pitch set for 7:10 PM ET.
Starting Pitchers
Blake Snell
The left-hander will look for his sixth win of the season tonight for the Rays. Snell has been impressive through ten starts, posting a 5-3 win-loss record with a 3.07 ERA, 26.2 K%, 8.2 BB%, and .199 opponents batting average through 58.2 innings pitched.
He is coming off a win against the Angels last Friday, giving up just two earned runs on four hits over 6.2 innings worked. He struck out eight and walked three as the Rays cruised to a 8-3 victory.
Through five starts, he has excelled against both RHB’s and LHB’s, holding hitters to the tune of .219/.291/.430 from the right side of the plate and a meager .130/.179/.226 slash-line from the left side of the plate.
He’s pitched extremely well versus the Red Sox this season. He went scoreless through 5 2⁄3 innings in his first start against Boston on March 30, then limited them to two runs through 7 2⁄3 innings on April 27.
Rick Porcello
The Rays will be facing one of most dominant pitchers of 2018 tonight in Rick Porcello, who is 6-1 with a 3.39 ERA, 2.80 FIP, and 3.32 xFIP in 63.2 innings pitched. He has dazzled this season to the tune of the ninth-highest pitching WAR in baseball.
The right-hander is coming off a win against the Orioles on Saturday, allowing three runs on six hits and three walks over six innings while striking out nine.
Much like Snell, Porcello has dominated both sides of the plate this season, posting a .225/.265/.455 against LHB’s and .233/.277/.267 against RHB’s. Also much like Snell, he’s been dominant against his opposition tonight, going 2-0 in three starts with a 3.10 ERA against the Rays this season.
His repertoire, per Brooks Baseball:
Rick Porcello has thrown 27,792 pitches that have been tracked by the PITCHf/x system between 2009 and 2018, including pitches thrown in the MLB Regular Season, the MLB Postseason and Spring Training. In 2018, he has relied primarily on his Sinker (91mph) and Slider (87mph), also mixing in a Fourseam Fastball (92mph), Change using a Palm Ball grip (82mph) and Curve (75mph).
Here’s how often he has used those offerings:
And here is how batters have fared against those pitches: