AL East
Team W L Pct. GB
New York 8863 .577—
Baltimore85 64 .5701
Tampa Bay 8070 .5336½
Boston 68 83.45019
Toronto 66 82.44619½
AL race for wild cards
Team W L Pct. GB
Baltimore 85 64 .570—
Oakland 8564 .570—
Los Angeles 81 69.54041/2
Tampa Bay 80 70 .533 51/2
Detroit7970 .5306
Top two wild cards make postseason; GB is games behind second wild card
Rays vs. Blue Jays
When/where: 7:10 tonight; Tropicana Field
TV/radio: Sun Sports; 620-AM, 680-AM (Spanish)
Tickets: Tickets: $12-$255, available at Tropicana Field box office, Ticketmaster, raysbaseball.com, team Tampa store; $3 surcharge within 5 hours of game time.
Promotion: Desmond Jennings T-shirt to first 10,000 fans.
Probable pitchers:
Rays: RH James Shields (14-9, 3.77)
Blue Jays: RH Carlos Villanueva (7-5, 3.42)
On Shields: Coming off a loss at New York on Saturday, in which he allowed costly back-to-back homers. Is 6-2, 2.25 with a .162 opponents average in past nine starts. Is 10-5, 3.40 in 20 start vs. Jays, 6-1 in his past nine.
On Villanueva: Only win in his past nine starts was Aug. 30 vs. Rays; threw six shutout innings. Otherwise, 0-5, 4.44 with 12 homers allowed. Overall is 1-2, 8.42 in eight games vs. Rays.
Key matchups
Rays vs. Villanueva
Jeff Keppinger 7-for-16
Luke Scott 4-for-13 HR
Ben Zobrist 4-for-8 3 HR
Jays vs. Shields
E. Encarnacion 4-for-20 HR
Adam Lind 12-for-43 5 HR
Jeff Mathis 2-for-17 7 K
On deck
Saturday: vs. Blue Jays, 7:10, Sun Sports. Rays — Matt Moore (10-11, 3.88); Blue Jays — Brandon Morrow (8-6, 2.98)
Sunday: vs. Blue Jays, 1:40, Sun Sports. Rays — Alex Cobb (9-9, 4.27), Blue Jays — TBA
Elliot's parking lot adventure
Fond of Twitter and originality, infielder Elliot Johnson (@elliotjohnson9) decided to take up a fan on his invitation and went to the Trop parking lot before Wednesday's game to play catch and visit. Chris Bell and his buddies were surprised when Johnson, in uniform pants and a workout shirt, showed up and stuck around 10-15 minutes. "They were good dudes," Johnson said. "It was a good time. Why not?" Bell, who posted a video on his @ChrisBellTB Twitter account, said: "EJ is such a great guy. Couldn't have been nicer. It was a great experience."
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