8* Tampa Bay (7:35 ET): So the Rays lost to the Red Sox again yesterday. They are now 0-4 against their division rival in 2021 and trail them by 1.5 games in the standings. Yes, I had the Rays last night and it was their seventh straight loss overall. But I still believe they are the better team here. The game went into extra innings last night, so 9-5 is definitely a misleading final score. Boston did all of its scoring in two innings. So did Tampa Bay for that matter. But producing a five-run inning and four-run inning in the same game against this Rays pitching staff is hard to do and won’t happen again. I’m on TB for the second straight night.

A big difference in last night’s game is that Boston was 6 for 10 with runners in scoring position while Tampa Bay was 3 for 17. That should correct itself tonight. Also, the news wasn’t all bad for the Rays on Tuesday as Walder Franco lived up to the hype in his big league debut, hitting a HR and a double. Speaking of misleading, the Red Sox have the division lead despite a +38 YTD run differential compared to the Rays’ +69. This is the worst stretch of the year for TB and they are due to turn things around.

Rich Hill will look to play stopper tonight for the home team. The southpaw has a 0.983 WHIP in seven home starts this year. Hill is off B2B shaky outings (allowed 4 runs both times), but before that he’d allowed no more than 2 ER in eight consecutive starts. Boston 1-5 L6 vs. lefties. Going into yesterday, opponents were batting just .207 here at Tropicana Field. Garrett Richards somehow has a 3-0 TSR in his L3 starts for Boston despite a 6.91 ERA and 2.163 WHIP. He’s definitely due to lose just as TB is due to beat Boston. They Rays are 51-19 L70 as ML home favorites. 8* Tampa Bay