Winners of three straight games, the Cleveland Indians will try to keep the momentum going on Friday evening at Progressive Field with the Tampa Bay Rays in town for the second game of the series.
Cleveland used a gem from right-hander Josh Tomlin to take Thursday's series opener by a narrow 3-1 score, and will hope that Friday's hurler Justin Masterson can continue his run of impressive performances. The 6-foot-6, Jamaican-born Masterson has yielded one run or less in four of his last five outings, and aside from a minor blowup at New York's softball-sized park, looks to be rounding out nicely into the top-of-the-rotation ace everyone expected him to be.
Outfielder Shin-Soo Choo will assume his usual spot atop Manny Acta's batting order, and is already off to a hot start in July (.350 average) after capping off the month of June with a .333 average from the plate. The often-undervalued Choo, who also smacked out his ninth home run of the season in Thursday's win, is well on his way towards producing the third 20-homer, 20-steal campaign of his career.
Here are Friday's lineups:
Indians
1. Shin-Soo Choo - RF
2. Asdrubal Cabrera - SS
3. Jason Kipnis - 2B
4. Travis Hafner - DH
5. Carlos Santana - C
6. Michael Brantley - CF
7. Casey Kotchman - 1B
8. Johnny Damon - LF
9. Jack Hannahan - 3B
Justin Masterson - SP
Rays
1. Desmond Jennings - LF
2. Carlos Pena - 1B
3. Ben Zobrist - RF
4. B.J. Upton - CF
5. Luke Scott - DH
6. Brooks Conrad - 3B
7. Jose Lobaton - C
8. Will Rhymes - 2B
9. Elliot Johnson - SS
Alex Cobb - SP
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