BOSTON — At some point this season, there may be an angry mob of pitchers confronting left fielder Manny Ramirez about his positioning.

Ramirez prefers to play a very shallow left field, especially in Fenway Park. Part of the thinking is that any ball over his head is probably going to be off the wall anyway, so by playing shallow there is a chance to catch loopers and liners over shortstop that otherwise would be falling in as base hits.

But the problem with that theory is that Ramirez is playing in so close that he’s unable to get back to the wall or even the warning track to haul in balls that should be caught.

There have been several cases in point on this homestand. Last Saturday against Toronto, there were two balls that got over his head and landed on the warning track dirt for doubles. There was another one on Sunday. None of those doubles cost the Sox a game.

And, by playing in shallow, he did rob Reed Johnson of a leadoff single on Sunday.

The tradeoff, though, doesn’t seem worth it. If he’s playing a more normal left field, balls may fall in front of him, but they’d be singles. If he’s in close and they go over his head, they’re extra-base hits.

Also, by playing in shallow, it limits his side-to-side range, so a hard-hit ball that should be a single can end up scooting past him for extra bases.

Last night, the positioning hurt Tim Wakefield and the Sox. Billy Butler lofted a fly ball to left-center in the fourth with runners at first and third and one out in a scoreless game. Had Ramirez been playing a normal left, he would have had a chance to catch the ball. Instead, the ball landed on the track and two runs scored.

Maybe it would have landed safely on the track, anyway. But when he had to turn his back to the ball and chase after it, Ramirez was unable to even fake out the baserunner at first. Mark Teahen, the runner, could tell from seeing the back of Ramirez’s jersey that the ball was not going to be caught.

That bit of knowledge, not to mention the extra seconds it took Ramirez to get to the ball after it bounced off the wall, allowed Teahen to score from first, giving the Royals a 2-0 lead.

In the seventh, Reggie Sanders led off with a liner toward the line, a legitimate single that became a double because Ramirez couldn’t cut it off. That wasn’t the reason the Royals wound up scoring five runs in the inning, but it got them off and running.

Certainly, playing in shallow fits into Ramirez’s comfort zone, and the Sox are loathe to do anything that will shake his comfort zones. But maybe they could ask him to move back a little, concede the singles and take away the doubles.

“Regardless of what the numbers say, if a guy is out of his comfort zone, he’s not going to make a lot of plays,” said manager Terry Francona. “You can push someone back all you want, but if they’re in the field thinking in, it’s not going to work.

Rookie mistake

Dustin Pedroia has been fundamentally sound, especially for a rookie, but the second baseman made a baserunning mistake in the seventh, ending a promising inning.

There were runners at first and second with one out and Boston was trailing, 8-1. Pedroia was the baserunner at first.

When David Ortiz lofted a drive to deep left-center, Pedroia, thinking the ball would make it to the wall, was around second base when left fielder Emil Brown jumped up at the wall and made the catch. Pedroia tried to retrace his steps, but he was easily doubled up at first base.

The question was, where was he going? Yes, he likely would have scored had the ball hit the wall. He was hustling. But, given the score, it was not a prudent gamble, and he and the Red Sox paid for the lapse in judgment.

“It looked like it was going off the wall, so I went. If I score, it’s 8-3. It’s an aggressive play,” said Pedroia.

Like father, like son

Tony Pena Jr. would not be a player the Red Sox would covet, at least not offensively.

The Royals’ shortstop entered last night’s game with a woeful .287 on-base percentage. He hadn’t walked in 215 plate appearances over his last 58 games. Pena had a total of 6 walks for the season, and he had played in 89 of Kansas City’s first 92 games. That averages out to one walk every 55.83 plate appearances.

Of course, he comes by his lack of patience at the plate naturally. His father, former All-Star catcher Tony Pena Sr., who spent the 1990-1993 seasons with the Red Sox, walked only 455 times in 18 big-league seasons, an average of 25.3 walks per season.

In the first two games of the series, Pena has come to the plate seven times and has seen only 16 pitches. He saw only six last night in four plate appearances, but he went 3 for 4, including a pair of doubles and two RBI.

Live and learn

The Red Sox tested Teahen, Kansas City’s right fielder, in several different ways over the first two innings.

And he passed each test with flying colors.

In the first, Teahen raced back to right center and hauled in Ramirez’s sizzling liner at the warning track, reaching up and gloving the ball on the dead run. In the second, Teahen ranged several steps to his right and hauled in Kevin Youkilis’ liner.

Then after Mike Lowell cracked a one-out double off the wall in left, he decided to test Teahen’s arm on Coco Crisp’s routine fly ball to right-center. Teahen made a perfect one-hop throw to third baseman Alex Gordon, who slapped the tag on the sliding Lowell for the inning-ending double play.

skrasner@projo.com