After building up a 10-game division lead following the All Star break, the New York Yankees now find themselves tied with the Baltimore Orioles.
The Yankees lost Tuesday night to the Tampa Bay Rays 5-2 and with Baltimore's win over Toronto 12-0, that seemingly safe cushion in the division is now gone.
"Nothing changes. We play everybody. How many games do we have left?" Shortstop Derek Jeter said to the Associated Press. "Win all of them, we're good, right? We don't have to worry about anybody else. We still have games left. We've got to find ways to win, that's the bottom line. Nothing's changed. You hope you have that one game where it seems to snowball from there."
The Yankees were up 2-0 in the first inning off a Robinson Cano home run, but couldn't muster up anymore offense as the Rays closed their own gap in the division to only 1 ½ games.
Even Longoria hit a go-ahead, two-run home run in the third inning, while BJ Upton and Desmond Jennings added solo shots for the Rays.
According to STATS LLC, The Yankees are only 19-26 since July 18, when they were up by 10 ½ games on the Rays.
"A lot of people on our side kind of wrote it off when we were 10½ games out, but I've been around long enough to know that this is a long season. A lot of things can happen, especially with the second wild card in place," said BJ Upton, according to the Associated Press. "So we kept our heads up and we're playing good baseball. We find ourselves a game and a half out in September. There's still a long way to go, a pretty tough schedule. We know what's ahead of us."
Yankees manager Joe Girardi was ejected from the game in the fourth inning, perhaps showing some frustration due to the way the Yankees have been playing. He was arguing with plate umpire Tony Randazzo after outfielder Chris Dickerson called for, but was not granted, a timeout. After Dickerson took a called third strike to finish the inning, Girardi erupted from the dugout.
New York has not played well this season at Tropicana Field, dropping to 1-7 on the road against the Rays.
The Yankees have lost five of six games and last night marked the fifth consecutive game they've been held to six or fewer, which is the team's longest stretch since going six straight from Aug. 30 to Sept. 5, 1990, according to the Associated Press.
Pitcher Freddy Garcia took the loss for the Yankees, giving up five runs on five hits in only five innings. He also gave up three home runs. Tampa closer Fernando Rodney closed out the game for his 42nd save of the year.
As for the Orioles, they finally caught up to the Yankees after dominating the Blue Jays 12-0.
Pitcher Zach Britton won his fourth start in a row and Mark Reynolds had four RBI's to power the Orioles to the win. Reynolds broke a 0-0 tie with a three-run home run and later singled in a run. The team scored all 12 runs after the fifth inning and scored five runs in the eighth.
The upstart Orioles have gone 8-2 in their last ten games and will start a four game series against the Yankees on Thursday after finishing up in Toronto Wednesday night.
Baltimore has also defied expectations by winning despite the fact that they have a minus-19 run differential. Usually the statistic can be used to measure how good a team actually is compared to how they are playing. For example, the Yankees have a plus-83 run differential, while the Rays have a plus-81 total.
The Orioles are easily the most surprising team in the major leagues this year and now has its sights set on the division. The Orioles haven't finished over .500 in the regular season or made the postseason since 1997.
On Wednesday night the Yankees will start Hiroki Kuroda (12-10, 3.04 ERA) against the Rays' young star Matt Moore (10-8, 3.58 ERA).
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