James Loney Batting Cleanup for Red Sox in Series Opener With Yankees

by Mike Cole on Tue, Sep 11, 2012 at 4:13PM

James Loney will get his first look at the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry on Tuesday night, and he'll do so from the middle of the Boston order.

Loney will hit cleanup for Bobby Valentine, for just the second time since being traded to Boston on Aug. 26. In Loney's only other appearance in the four hole with the Sox, he went 3-for-4 with a home run in a loss to the Angels on Aug. 30.

Loney is a career .272 hitter from the cleanup spot in 129 games. In those 528 at-bats, he has nine home runs and 72 RBIs to go along with a .711 OPS.

Here are the lineups for the first of three games between the Sox and the first-place Yankees.

Red Sox
Jacoby Ellsbury, CF
Scott Podsednik, DH
Dustin Pedroia, 2B
James Loney, 1B
Cody Ross, LF
Ryan Lavarnway, C
Ryan Kalilsh, RF
Pedro Ciriaco, 3B
Mike Aviles, SS

Jon Lester, P

Yankees
Derek Jeter, SS
Nick Swisher, RF
Alex Rodriguez, DH
Robinson Cano, 2B
Russell Martin, C
Steve Pearce, 1B
Curtis Granderson, CF
Andruw Jones, LF
Jayson Nix, 3B

Hiroki Kuroda, P