Tampa Bay Rays continue torrid play, lead al east by 3 ½ games

Things aren’t looking to good for fans of the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees who’ve been pinning their hopes for a division title on the inevitable collapse of the upstart Tampa Bay Rays: it doesn’t look like its going to happen. Well into August, the Rays are in first place exactly where they were over a month ago on the 4th of July—the traditional harbinger of the ultimate division winner. Even more daunting for the Yankees and Red Sox is that they’ve been spinning their wheels trying to make up ground while Tampa Bay keeps playing well. New York and Boston have been trying to deal with injuries and major trades and have been doing their best to tread water in the suddenly wide open division. Tampa Bay, meanwhile, has won 8 of their L10 and 10 of their L14 games.

What’s really been impressive about the Tampa Bay uprising is how the entire team is contributing and the way that even potentially bad news has had a silver lining. Take the case of presumptive AL rookie of the year, Evan Longoria. He, along with his team leading HR and RBI numbers, missed Friday’s game with a bruised hand. First baseman Carlos Pena picked up the slack with a HR and two RBI’s as the Rays beat Seattle.

Another component of the Rays success has been the resurrection of closer Troy Percival. The 38 year old came out of retirement to bolster the team’s bullpen and has not only been a contributor but has dominated. Percival, who couldn’t find a job in the major leagues a year ago forcing him into an early retirement, picked up his 25th save on Friday night. The Rays record when Percival enters in a save situation is astounding—its also perfect, at 25-0.

While its still premature for the team to start making travel plans for October—28 of their final 47 games are on the road—the Friday night win stretched their lead over Boston to the largest its been since July 7th.

More importantly, if the Red Sox and the Yankees were counting on a Tampa Bay collapse it might be time for the two storied franchises to start looking at a “Plan B” on which to pin their post season hopes.