With the season coming to a close in the coming weeks, I figured I would write about how the New York Yankees can surpass the Boston Red Sox and once again reign supreme over the Al East. It sucks that us Yankee fans have to rely on other bad teams like the Tampa Bay Rays and Baltimore Orioles to beat the Red Sox night in and night out so that our boys can retake the division. With Boston's lead at only three games, and with only ten games remaining the opportunity to take the division is getting slim. However, the Yankees have seven of their final ten games at home in the friendly confines of Yankee Stadium where they are a healthy 46-28 this year.

Here are three ways the Yankees can take the division.

The offense continues to produce

Obviously, in any MLB game, a team needs to score runs to win games, but this Yankees offense has been on fire lately. Since August 31st, the team has the second-best record only to the Indians and has averaged the most runs per game during that span. Today was absolutely no different as the Yankees walloped the poor Minnesota Twins 11-3. Aaron Judge hit a freaking opposite field home run which was followed by a Gary Sanchez bomb to straightaway center field. If they can keep this up and pray that the Red Sox drop a couple of games here and there, they can secure the division crown.

Red Sox slump

The Red Sox have 11 games left on their schedule.

Their series against the Orioles wraps up tonight with Chris Sale on the mound so it's highly unlikely the Yankees can get a game on them today. Boston then goes to Cincinnati to play the awful Reds, and finish the season off in Fenway for a three-game set against the Blue Jays and a four-game set against the Houston Astros. The Reds and Blue Jays are not playing good baseball right now, so the Yankees opportunity to strike will be in the last four games of the season when Boston takes on the red-hot Astros in what will most likely be a playoff matchup preview.

The Red Sox have been on a weird winning streak where they produce no offense, and win the game in like the 12th inning every night, and it is the most upsetting, disappointing, heart-wrenching thing in the world to watch. Hopefully, whoever they play can win an extra-inning game against them for once.

Luck

Honestly, through 152 games in the season everyone knows who deserves to win their respective division.

But I really think the American League is an example of where this is not true. The Yankees had some bad injury luck for most of the season. Sanchez missed a month, Didi Gregorious missed a month, Starlin Castro and Matt Holliday who were huge contributors earlier in the season also went down for a couple of months. The Yankees honestly probably deserve to win the division. Boston's offense has wildly underperformed this season and I'm hoping that will show in the playoffs. Either way, the Yankees need to make up three games in about two weeks, which is going to take some dominant pitching performances, a lot of offense, and even more luck. I'll be wishing for Boston to bum it and have to play Cleveland in the first round of the playoffs.
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED