The Tampa Bay Rays have won their second American League East title in their brief history. This season's division championship came down to the final day of the regular season. The Rays had the division in hand once the Yankees lost to the Red Sox but would've won regardless by defeating Kansas City.
The win also clinched home field advantage for the American League Divisional Series and American League Championship Series if they advance since they finished with the best record in the American League. The Rays went 5-5 in their last 10 games to closeout the season.
Now the Rays prepare for the Texas Rangers.
The Rangers clinched the AL West Division Championship back on September 25th. This season will mark their fourth trip to the postseason. Prior to this season they had the sixth longest playoff drought in the majors with the 11 year gap since their 1999 AL West title. They closed out the regular season 6-4 in their last 10 games.
Since 2007, the team that has won game one of the ALDS has gone on to win the series. If this trend were to continue in 2010, that would make the match-up of David Price vs. Cliff Lee that much more important. Since the opening round of the MLB Playoffs is a five-game series, a team winning the first game needs only split the remainder of games to advance to the ALCS.
David Price will be on the mound for the mound for the Rays in game one. In his last 10 appearances, Price is 4-1 with a 2.43 ERA and 55 strikeouts. He also has averaged close to seven innings per start this season. It will be important for him to have a great start since the Rays are 84-13 when tied or leading after six innings in 2010.
Cliff Lee has yet to win a game against the Tampa Bay Rays this season going 0-3. The key for the Rays in all three games was scoring critical runs in the eighth inning. Lee has given up eight earned runs to Tampa Bay in the eighth inning this season.
In all three games Lee's team was either in the lead or tied going into the eighth. If the Rays can either jump out ahead early or take advantage of Lee again late they will be poised to face the winner of the Twins-Yankees series.
The Rangers power hitting team has a .276 batting average for the season. However, they are only hitting .227 in Tropicana Field. Also, Josh Hamilton is bringing in a miserable .100 batting average for the season in Tampa Bay.
These factors combined setup game one to be a close game that the Rays will probably find a way to squeeze out late. If the Rays get into a position for Rafael Soriano to get a save opportunity in game one, they will likely take the game and eventually the series.
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