The Red Sox were slow to release their lineup on Friday. The team took the field for batting practice. It hit for an hour. Both the Dodgers and Giants—whose game was scheduled to start two hours after this one—released their lineups out on the West Coast. And still there was no sign of a starting nine for Boston.
There was no attempt at gamesmanship or secrecy here. (Skipper Alex Cora freely rattled off the first four hitters when asked before the game; it was the rest, he said, of which he was still unsure.) There was simply a genuine question: Would J.