Yankees see an opportunity to gain ground on Boston

Yankees players may be downplaying the significance of this weekend’s four-game series at Boston, but there’s no question the upcoming contests carry some weight.

With the Yankees entering Thursday trailing the Red Sox by 5 1⁄2 games despite the second-best record in baseball at 68-38, the players still believe they largely control their destiny.

“If we play the ball we’re capable of playing, we’ll catch them,” said outfielder Brett Gardner after the Yankees’ 7-5 home loss to Baltimore Wednesday afternoon.

“And if we don’t, we won’t. That’s the way I look at it. There’s no need in adding any urgency or putting any pressure on ourselves than there already is. For me, just focus on ourselves and focus on continuing to play our game.”

The Yankees, which hold a 5-4 advantage over Boston this year, have 10 games remaining against their biggest rivals, including three games to finish the regular-season at Boston which might ultimately decide the division winner. Boston leads baseball with a 75-34 record.

“We know we have to play well,” infielder Neil Walker said. “We know we have a lot of games against these guys left down the stretch but more than that, we feel like there’s some good opportunities to gain some ground. So there’s no better way of doing that than to play those guys head-to-head.”

The Yankees may have caught a break with Chris Sale — who was scheduled to start Thursday — placed on the disabled list Tuesday with shoulder inflammation, and instead will open the series with a matchup of Brian Johnson against CC Sabathia.

The Yankees are slated to throw Luis Severino Friday and Masahiro Tanaka Sunday with J.A. Happ tentatively scheduled to start Saturday. But Boone said the team is unsure yet if Happ will be able to pitch as he needs to be cleared by doctors after dealing with a mild case of hand, foot, and mouth disease.

The Red Sox are scheduled to throw Rick Porcello Friday, Nathan Eovaldi Saturday and David Price Sunday.

“They got a good team, we got a good team, I think it’s going to be a good matchup,” Gardner said. “We always seem to give the fans what they want, both teams do, and it’s always entertaining and it’s always a great atmosphere, so looking forward to the challenge.”

The biggest difference between the Yankees and Red Sox this season seems to be Boston’s ability to dominate the weaker teams in the division. Boston is 29-9 against Toronto, Baltimore and Tampa Bay this season, with the Yankees 21-15 against the same squads.

“We have to assume that they’re going to take care of business outside of the games against us,” Walker said. “We know that we play them well and we know they play well at home and have played well all year, so we think we can go in there and play our best baseball.”