{"id":16365,"date":"2011-07-07T10:00:37","date_gmt":"2011-07-07T15:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=16365"},"modified":"2011-07-07T10:00:37","modified_gmt":"2011-07-07T15:00:37","slug":"al-east-rivalry-new-york-yankees-host-tampa-bay-rays-before-all-star-break","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/al-east-rivalry-new-york-yankees-host-tampa-bay-rays-before-all-star-break-16365\/","title":{"rendered":"AL East Rivalry: New York Yankees Host Tampa Bay Rays Before All-Star Break"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays and New York Yankees open up a four-game series Thursday night at Yankee Stadium<\/p>\n

Tampa Bay Rays at New York Yankees<\/strong><\/p>\n

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New York Yankees SS Derek Jeter stands at 2,997 career hits entering tonight's game versus Tampa Bay<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tampa Bay enters a very critical portion of its scheduled Thursday in playing the first of 11 straight games against New York and Boston.\u00a0 \u201cWe want to go back to the playoffs and we expect to win the division again,\u201d Rays manager Joe Maddon commented.\u00a0 The Rays avoided being swept for the first time in a series of three games or more last night by tallying a 12-5 victory in Minnesota.\u00a0 The 12 runs marked the fourth time this season that the club has reached double digits offensively.\u00a0 Third baseman Evan Longoria also got into the act, hitting a home run and knocking in four runs, after hitting just .115 in his previous seven games.\u00a0 Tampa Bay is 27-18 on the road this season and 15-12 when facing divisional opponents.<\/p>\n

Rays starting pitcher Jeff Niemann will be making his 10th start of the season and enters with a 4-5 record and 5.05 ERA.\u00a0 He earned a 5-1 win in his last outing versus St. Louis, which was also his 30th career win.\u00a0 It also served as his first career win allowing nine or more hits.\u00a0 Niemann is 2-1 with a 4.34 ERA in four starts on the road compared to a 1-3 mark and 5.53 ERA in five outings at home.\u00a0 The right-hander will be making his fifth career appearance versus the Yankees, going 2-0 with a 3.74 ERA, including a 1-0 mark and 3.78 ERA in three outings at tonight\u2019s venue.<\/p>\n

New York sits atop the American League East standings, but nobody is concerned with that at the moment due to All-Star shortstop Derek Jeter being three hits shy of 3,000 for his career.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m looking forward to it,\u201d Jeter stated after Wednesday\u2019s 5-3 loss in Cleveland.\u00a0 \u201cI wanted more today, but that wasn\u2019t the case.\u201d\u00a0 The Yankees have been playing tremendous baseball in returning home before the All-Star break, posting an 18-7 mark since June 10.\u00a0 Over that particular stretch, the offense has been averaging nearly six runs a game (5.79) and hitting .283.\u00a0 The club will be playing its first of nine home games versus Tampa Bay tonight, as it brings in a dominating 75-34 all-time home record in the series.<\/p>\n

Yankees starting pitcher Bartolo Colon is a solid 6-3 with a 2.88 ERA in 14 outings (11 starts) this season and will be searching for his fifth consecutive win.\u00a0 The right-hander tallied a 5-2 road victory over the Mets on July 2, tossing six scoreless innings without issuing a walk and registering six strikeouts.\u00a0 Colon is an even 2-2 with a 3.48 ERA in six home appearances (four starts), allowing opponents to hit for a .236 average.\u00a0 In 18 previous starts versus the Rays, the former Cy Young Award winner has recorded a 9-2 record and 3.63 ERA.<\/p>\n

Bettors will be interested in backing the Rays due toe their 12-5 mark in Niemann\u2019s last 17 road starts, while the Yankees are 27-29 at night<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Tampa Bay Rays and New York Yankees open up a four-game series Thursday night at Yankee Stadium Tampa Bay Rays at New York Yankees Tampa Bay enters a very critical portion of its scheduled Thursday in playing the first of 11 straight games against New York and Boston.\u00a0 \u201cWe want to go back to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":4792,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[1575,981,527,1981,1943,149,150,785],"class_list":["post-16365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-al-east","tag-bartolo-colon","tag-derek-jeter","tag-evan-longoria","tag-jeff-niemann","tag-new-york-yankees","tag-tampa-bay-rays","tag-yankee-stadium"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16365"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16365\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16366,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16365\/revisions\/16366"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}