While the New York Yankees are locked in a tight race with the Baltimore Orioles for American League East supremacy, the Cleveland Guardians are finding their lead in the AL Central growing somewhat tenuous in recent weeks. Both teams will attempt to improve their positioning in their respective divisions Tuesday night when the Yankees host the Guardians in the opener of a three-game series. The Yankees took two of three in Cleveland April 13-14 and are three percentage points ahead of the Guardians at .
584. New York is 13-7 in its past 20 games after dropping 23 of its previous 33 from June 15-July 26, but the Yankees also went an underwhelming 8-7 in a stretch of 15 straight games against opponents with losing records. After scoring 10 runs Wednesday against the Chicago White Sox, the Yankees were held to five runs and 15 hits and dropped two of three to the Detroit Tigers over the weekend.
The Yankees split the first two games of the series in Detroit before traveling to Williamsport, Pa., for the Little League Classic, where they were handed a 3-2, 10-inning loss when Clay Holmes blew a 1-0 lead for his major league-leading 10th blown save. Holmes' blown save occurred before Mark Leiter Jr.
allowed the game-winning hit in the 10th. Holmes converted his first 13 of his first 14 saves but has blown nine of 22 save chances since then, though manager Aaron Boone said the right-hander would remain the closer. "I can think of a couple of them where we didn't make a play and it .