Tonight in St. Petersburg that Tampa Bay Rays face the first place New York Yankees. New York is 9-3 while the Rays at sitting at 5-7 in third place in the AL East.
So, while one might ay there is plenty of time to catch the Bronx Bombers in the 2020 MLB season with only 60 games and who knows if or when the season might end, each game is important. That means Tampa Bay really could use a series win this weekend.
PITCHING PROBABLES: Yankees: Masahiro Tanaka (0-0, 3.38 ERA, 1.88 WHIP, 3 strikeouts) Rays: Blake Snell (0-0, 5.40 ERA, 1.80 WHIP, 9 strikeouts)
LINE: Rays favored by 1 1/2 runs; over/under is 8 1/2 runs
BOTTOM LINE: The Tampa Bay Rays play the New York Yankees on Friday.
The Rays finished 44-32 against AL East Division opponents in 2019. Tampa Bay pitchers struck out 10.0 hitters per game last year with a staff ERA of 3.65.
Big series with plenty of plot twists but this is again a really big series for the Rays to win if they want to stay in the race in 2020.
The Yankees went 54-22 in division games in 2019. New York averaged 9.2 hits with 3.8 extra base hits per game and 290 total doubles last year.
The teams meet for the first time this year.
INJURIES: Rays: Colin Poche: (elbow), Yonny Chirinos: (right triceps).
Yankees: Luis Severino: (elbow), Tommy Kahnle: (forearm).
