The defending champion New York Yankees have managed to shake off the perennial rival Boston Red Sox in 2010. Big sigh of relief, right? Not so much. Their big leads have been evaporating quickly and extra innings often ensue with the knowledge that the second-place Tampa Bay Rays are close behind enough to water ski from New York's tail.
It used to be the Yankees and the Red Sox every year. With Boston hanging from a thread in the AL East, the Rays have proven to be far more than just an understudy. In 2008, when the Yankees dropped out of competitive play, the then-unheralded Rays dared challenge the defending champs from Beantown and won both the division and the ALCS from them in dramatic fashion. This season, the Rays instead find themselves battling the Bronx Bombers, once again showing no signs of backing down.
On September 13th, the Yankees went into Tropicana Field to play a three-game series against the Rays leading by a mere half-game in the standings. While the lesser team was still highly likely to qualify for the postseason via the wild card, both teams were after home-field and the division crown.
What followed were three truly mesmerizing contests that left not just the East Coast media, but true baseball fans clamoring for more. Luckily for them, more is coming, as a four-game rematch in the Bronx awaits. Of course, all this only serves as a prelude to what hopes to be an eventual battle in October with a World Series berth at stake.
Going into that series in Tampa Bay, the Yankees had been walked off twice in a three-game sweep by the AL West-leading Texas Rangers. The Rays had just been walked off once in the previous series in Toronto, but had also won a game in that series with clutch hitting in the ninth inning. The two teams continued their trend of playing heartburn baseball against one another.
The first game of the series was a regular masterpiece as C.C. Sabathia locked up against David Price, the top two left-handers in the American League. Neither one was willing to budge. By the eighth inning, both starters were out of the game, but neither team had scored. Third base was a ghost town, as no player from either team had reached that far.
Using various relief pitchers, both teams wiggled out of tight spots through extra innings until the bottom of the 11th. Reed Brignac stepped up to the plate only because starter Carl Crawford had been ejected on arguing a strike three call in the ninth. Brignac turned reliever Chad Gaudin's down-and-in offering into a beautiful tee shot that landed in a blissful gallery of fans in the right field bleachers, ending a dramatic game 1-0 and giving the Rays first place.
The following game saw the Yankees take a relatively safe 6-0 lead into the fifth with rookie pitcher Ivan Nova carving out Rays hitters up to that point. The kid lost his stuff quickly, though. Carlos Pena led-off with a homer. Then a double. An RBI single followed by John Jaso. A walk, an Evan Longoria single plated another, followed by a Matt Joyce RBI single. Finally at 6-4, the youngster Nova was removed by a late-arriving Joe Girardi. Reliever Boone Logan came on only to give up a Willie Aybar blast to left, giving the Rays a shocking 7-6 lead.
The Yanks quickly answered back with a Cano RBI double, and it was 7-7 from that point on. The Rays appeared to have a 2-out double in the ninth, but center fielder Curtis Granderson spoiled it with a spectacular diving catch. Jorge Posada then hit what may have been the longest home run of his career over the roof of the restaurant beyond the dead center field wall in the 10th.
The Rays threatened in the bottom half of the inning as Carl Crawford reached second base with one out against Mariano Rivera. Matt Joyce's fly ball to medium right seemed to assure Crawford of third base on a tag play, but September call-up Greg Golson revealed Ichiro-like arm strength, gunning down one of the game's fastest runners. It took a clothesline throw from right field to third base to end the game 8-7, and put the Yankees back in first.
While not quite as dramatic as the first two games, Tampa's Dan Johnson surprised with a pair of two-run homers to give Tampa Bay the division lead back. Both came at the expense of Phil Hughes and the second one came with two out in the seventh, proving to be the game winner in another 4-3 nail-biter.
After the teams played respective series against the Angels and Orioles, the Yankees had regained the half-game lead going into part two of this battle in the Bronx, which opened with more dramatics. Ivan Nova blew yet another big lead in the sixth, this time seeing a 4-0 lead turned into a 4-4 tie, as Girardi again waited too long to take out his doe-eyed rookie. This time it was Curtis Granderson hitting 2 home runs though, the second a mighty 3-run shot off the top of the foul pole in the seventh, giving the Yanks a decisive 8-4 cushion.
Rivera would provide a scare before finally wrapping up the game 8-6 on a night when the late George Steinbrenner was honored with a monument. With three more potential thrillers in the wings over the course of the week, no baseball fan is complaining.
These games have been reminiscent of both Yankees/Red Sox games past and even the old Yankees/Mariners division series of the 1990s (particularly the dome aspect in Tampa) in that both teams seem to rise up and get what they need the instant they fall behind, often leading to grueling stalemates and extra innings.
While there is no telling what Texas and Minnesota will do to these teams in the division series, because both teams are more than capable of pulling off upsets, one can only hope that the stage is about to be set for a New York/Tampa Bay ALCS packed with games just like the ones we've seen this past week. The Yankees and Rays simply bring out the best in themselves and each other.
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