strained right calf<\/a>, Judge has resumed hitting.<\/p>\n\u201cSaturday\u2019s a long ways away, but I\u2019m doing everything I can, all morning, night, during the game, everything to prepare myself to be ready to go,\u201d Judge said. \u201cSo I want to be in there. So we\u2019ll see what happens.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay won the season series 7-6 en route to an AL-best 98-64 record, their runners often spinning around the bases like a roulette ball going around the wheel. The Rays were sixth in the major leagues with a .326 on-base percentage and tied for second with 164 stolen bases.<\/p>\n
Rays batters struck out the fewest times in the major leagues at 1,145, an average of about two per game fewer than the Yankees.<\/p>\n
Because they won the AL East and had a bye, the Rays will enter the series with five days\u2019 rest \u2014 which some in baseball is convinced causes rust.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe alternative is playing three must-win games or two out of three. I\u2019ll take where we\u2019re at,\u201d Rays manager Kevin Cash said.<\/p>\n
Rays left-handed pitchers held lefty batters to a .205 average during the regular season. Yankees lefty batters hit .500 (11 for 22) against Boston southpaws.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey faced so many guys for months there where we were very left-handed, where in the fifth inning every day it was one lefty and then another one because that\u2019s how they attack us,\u201d Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. \u201cSo I\u2019d like to think some of that familiarity and reps and all that prepared us well.\u201d<\/p>\n
New York was second in the majors with 223 home runs, three behind Houston. What was often a home-run-or-bust batting order diversified in the Wild Card Series.<\/p>\n
Homegrown players \u2014 Rice, Spencer Jones, George Lombard Jr., Anthony Volpe and Austin Wells \u2014 combined for 11 RBIs.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe young guys have done a tremendous job,\u201d outfielder Cody Bellinger said. \u201cIt\u2019s been fun to watch. It\u2019s fun to watch them grow and they\u2019ve been a huge part of our success.\u201d<\/p>\n
See AP\u2019s full MLB coverage here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bozemandailychronicle.com offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced. NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Having…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":818867,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2377],"tags":[5,4,256,2305,8080,297,185,2550,68,2551,2549,99650],"class_list":["post-818866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa-bay-rays","tag-baseball","tag-mlb","tag-mlb-baseball","tag-mlb-playoffs","tag-mlb-world-series","tag-rays","tag-sports","tag-tampa-bay","tag-tampa-bay-rays","tag-tampabay","tag-tampabayrays","tag-yankees-rays-al-division-series"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/117365629498574938","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/818867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}