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Red Sox hope to end Yankees playoff hopes

Aug 27, 2008 - 10:50 AM Boston (76-55) at NY Yankees (70-61) 7:05 p.m. EDT

BRONX, New York (Ticker) -- The Boston Red Sox would like nothing more than to bury their division rivals. The New York Yankees are hoping to hang on a little longer.

The Red Sox will be looking to push their lead in the wild-card race to seven games over the Yankees when the teams meet on Wednesday at Yankee Stadium.

Boston took the series opener, 7-3 on Tuesday as Jason Bay and rookie Jeff Bailey drove in two runs apiece and Tim Wakefield returned from the disabled list with five solid innings.

The win moved the Red Sox six games ahead of the Yankees and two games ahead of the Minnesota Twins (74-57) in the wild-card race and pulled them to within 3 1/2 games of the Tampa Bay Rays (79-51) in the AL East.

Alex Rodriguez struggled, going 0-for-5 with two strikeouts while grounding into a pair of double plays and committing an error.

Paul Byrd (8-11, 4.61 ERA) will make his third start for the Red Sox. The veteran righthander has allowed eight runs and 16 hits in 13 1/3 innings since coming over to Boston in a waiver trade with the Cleveland Indians on August 12.

He has faced the Yankees twice this season - both times for Cleveland - and has gone 1-1 while allowing a combined nine runs in 12 innings.

New York will counter with Sidney Ponson (7-4, 4.67). The hefty righthander is coming off his worst start since joining the Yankees, allowing seven runs and eight hits in two innings to suffer a loss at Toronto.

Ponson allowed seven runs in four innings to take a loss at Boston on July 27 and is 3-3 with a 5.46 ERA with New York.