Las Vegas at Boston

The Athletics arrive at Fenway on a five-game road skid and a 45-70 record that isn't hiding anything, and Jack Perkins doesn't offer much cover: a 6.72 ERA and 1.40 WHIP that rank him near the bottom of full-time starters in baseball. Payton Tolle counters for Boston with a 3.30 ERA and a strikeout rate that keeps climbing, part of a Red Sox staff that ranks second in the American League in ERA. We tried to fade this Boston lineup Thursday with a White Sox flyer, and it cost us in a wild one, 12-11, the kind of result that says more about how hard Boston is playing right now than about any one pitcher on the mound. Boston sits at 63-51 and has already taken three of four in this season series, and Perkins walking this lineup even a handful of times turns tonight into exactly the kind of game the Athletics can't survive right now. Boston is the play tonight.