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Roger Mooney

Roger Mooney covers the Tampa Bay Rays for The Tampa Tribune, TBO.com and News Channel 8. He has covered the Rays since their first season in 1998, including 11 years for the Bradenton Herald. Roger has also covered Florida, South Florida and Florida State football, the Bucs and the Lightning.

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Rays @ Yankees: The push is on

Posted Sep 20, 2011 by Roger Mooney

Updated Sep 20, 2011 at 05:50 PM

ROGER MOONEY
NEW YORK The Rays open another critical four-game series tonight, this time with the Yankees at Yankee Stadium on what could be a wet evening in the Bronx.

The forecast calls for a 10 percent chance of rain at game time and 30 percent at 9 p.m.

The Rays begin the day two games back of the Wild Card-leading Red Sox, who play the Orioles tonight in Boston. The Red Sox magic number to clinch the Wild Card is eight, meaning a combination of Red Sox wins and Rays loses that total eight will eliminate the Rays.

Ben Zobrist will not play tonight. He returned home Monday to be with his wife for the birth of their daughter.

Wade Davis (10-9, 4.41) is on the mound, making his first start of the season against the Yankees.

“I love it,” Davis said of pitching at the stadium. “The clay on the mound, the way it feels. The hype of the stadium. The amount of pressure and people there, the team you’re going up against. It’s a challenge, but it’s a whole other experience. That’s baseball right there. You’re growing up as a kid you always see those guys in the postseason, you see those guys do crazy things, making crazy plays, to go in that stadium and win is better than any feeling.”

Ivan Nova (15-4, 3.81) starts for the Yankees.

The teams are back at it tomorrow for a day/night doubleheader. The Yankees are starting CC Sabathia and Phil Hughes in the twin bill, but they have yet to declare which pitcher starts which game.

Tonight’s game begins a stretch of 10 games in nine days for the Rays, including seven with the first-place Yankees.

This starts the final push for the Rays, who are trying to become the first team in major league history to reach the post-season after trailing by nine games in September. The Rays were nine games back of the Red Sox on Sept. 2.

Here are the lineups:

RAYS
Jennings LF
Upton CF
Longoria 3B
Damon DH
Kotchman 1B
Joyce RF
Rodriguez 2B
Shoppach C
Brignac SS
—
Davis P

YANKEES
Jeter SS
Granderson CF
Teixeira 1B
Rodriguez DH
Cano 2B
Swisher RF
Chavez 3B
Martin C
Gardner LF
—
Nova P