Francona

BOSTON — Finally, a breather on the Boston Red Sox’ home schedule.

After hosting three teams — Detroit, Atlanta and Cleveland — that either were in first place or a game or two out of the lead in their respective divisions when they entered Fenway Park, the Red Sox tonight get a chance to feast on a bottom-dweller.

The New York Yankees.

How sweet is that unlikely link for Red Sox fans — the Yankees and their gazillion-dollar payroll and a last-place tie with the always-woeful Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

There are a whopping 13½ games between first-place Boston and New York in the American League East standings, prompting many people to proclaim the Yankees dead in the divisional pennant race.

If that’s to be believed, then the Red Sox might as well start printing playoff tickets now and reserve hotel rooms in October for the first round of the playoffs because if the Yankees can’t catch Boston, it’s even less likely that Baltimore, Toronto and the Devil Rays will put a scare into the Sox’ cushy standing.

So with 110 games remaining for Boston (to 111 for the Yanks), this three-game weekend series means nothing if you buy into that thinking.

Of course, the Red Sox don’t buy into that thinking, at least not publicly. While they appreciate their 36-16 start, the best record in the majors, not to mention the Yanks’ 22-29 start, (only two teams in the A.L. have worse winning percentages), Boston is taking the old “one game at a time” view of things, a philosophy that so far has worked wonders.

Still, the big gap (Boston leads the second-place Orioles by 10½ games) has given Red Sox manager Terry Francona the opportunity to keep players rested, not to mention the ability to give nicked-up players more time to heal.

David Ortiz, for instance, had hamstring issues. Could he have played earlier this week? Most likely, had a pennant been on the line. And while Francona prefers to protect his players’ health as best he can, the luxury of a double-digit lead made it a lot easier for him to hold out Ortiz for three games so he’s presumably healthy for the Yanks.

One interesting aspect of the Sox’ success has been the team’s offense. The batting averages of the starters do not jump off the page.

Tonight, for instance, when Tim Wakefield starts against Chien-Ming Wang, the batting averages of the Sox’ lineup, from top to bottom, will be .230 (Julio Lugo), .354 (Kevin Youkilis), .315 (Ortiz), .269 (Manny Ramirez), .226 (J.D. Drew), .330 (Mike Lowell), .229 (Coco Crisp) and .190 (Doug Mirabelli), with either Alex Cora (.316) or surging Dustin Pedroia (.308) manning the other spot.

Somehow, though, the Sox are getting it done at the plate, featuring red-hot Youkilis and Lowell, doubles machine Ortiz (he hasn’t had a homer since May 9 — 16 games and 56 at-bats ago) and Pedroia. The others, though, seem to make their 1-for-4s count, often bunching those hits in one inning.

And, of course, the biggest reason for a satisfying first 52 games of the season is the starting pitching.

“We really like our lineup,” said Francona the other night. “The numbers will be there at the end of the season. But when you pitch (well) consistently, you give yourselves a chance to win most nights. That’s not saying you’re going to win. But we’re getting offense in key spots.”

Then there are the Yankees, the other half of this weekend’s equation.

While the Sox seem to be in a bubble where they can do little wrong, the Yanks are in the opposite bubble. Whatever can go wrong has gone wrong. Early in the year they hit like crazy but couldn’t win because the pitching was horrible and ravaged by injuries. Lately, the pitching has stabilized (and Roger Clemens returns on Monday), but the lineup of All-Stars hasn’t hit at all.

Throw in the fact that Alex Rodriguez is being haunted by paparazzi, creating another distraction to go along with the will-he-be-fired clouds hanging over general manager Brian Cashman and manager Joe Torre, and pile on the news yesterday that Jason Giambi will miss at least three weeks because of torn tissue in his arch, and the team is a mess.

Little wonder the Yankees are being written off. And if the Red Sox can pick at New York’s decaying carcass a few times this weekend, they know they will not be putting the final nails in the Yanks’ coffin, but they will be putting even more distance between the two rivals, which is a good thing at any time of the season.

skrasner@projo.com