Boone liking Yankees’ chances vs. Rays away from Trop

The Orioles have already hung around longer than most people thought when the 60-game season opened, but when it comes to crunch time in the AL East the Yankees and Rays are the betting favorites to fight it out for the title.

Having dropped three of four to the Rays at Tropicana Field earlier this month when the Yankees took exception to Rays hurlers pitching their hitters up and in throughout the weekend adds more flavor to a rivalry that has evolved into so much more than the Red Sox-Yankees.

So, away from Tropicana Field and at Yankee Stadium the Yankees get a chance to put some distance between themselves and the pesky Rays. The Yankees hold a 2 ½-game lead over the secondplace Rays after beating the Red Sox, 6-3, Monday night at the Stadium.

Since the remaining six games against the Rays are in The Bronx it is imperative the Yankees don’t suffer the same fate they did in St. Petersburg, Fla.

“I thought we did a lot of things in that series pretty well. Even though we didn’t score a ton of runs outside of the one game we played I thought we gave ourselves a lot of opportunities and that is what you have to do against them,’’ Aaron Boone said Monday of his team that went 4-for-27 (.148) with runners in scoring position during the series. “Give yourself as many opportunities as you can because you know it is going to be challenging to score and score big against them but if we give ourselves opportunities and capitalize when we have those chances and to continue to pitch well against them then we will like our chances.’’

➤ The Yankees will carefully watch the workload of Aroldis Chapman, who gave up a run in the ninth inning Monday, as the lefty returns from the COVID-19 injured list but Boone made it clear he will be asked to get the final three outs.

“He will be the closer,’’ Boone said.