A closer look at the Yankees' thrilling series with the Rays

Saturday's hero was none other than captain Aaron Judge. Judge's two home runs and four RBI locked down another much-needed win for the Yankees.

Anthony Volpe had a fantastic series, going 5-for-15 with two home runs, four RBI, and a pair of stolen bases. Volpe is developing nicely and slowly evolving into everything Yankees fans anticipated. 

The series could have been a massive win for the Yankees and a morale boost if it were not for one bad pitch. In the fifth inning on Sunday, Albert Abreu threw four consecutive change-ups to Rays third baseman Taylor Walls. Walls feasted on the fourth off-speed pitch sending over the fence in right field for a grand slam.

"Honestly, seeing that many pitches—offspeed—in a row, my eyes adjusted," Walls said. "I was looking for a pitch that was up in the zone that I could handle. So I put a good swing on it."

That grand slam gave the Rays a four-run lead that would prove enough to hold off the Yankees. Consequently, that one poor decision to pitch a fourth consecutive change-up cost the game, the series and the chance for the Yankees to climb out of the AL East cellar.

It was a big situation in the game, and my job is to go in there and minimize damage," Abreu said through the club's interpreter. "Unfortunately, we missed the location. … We execute that pitch, I think we get the result we want. But unfortunately, it ended up in his power zone, and we paid a high price today because of that."

Judge tried to pull off some more late-game heroics when he blasted a ball deep to center with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. But, unfortunately, it fell just a foot short of clearing the wall. It could have made an unbelievable ending to an unforgettable series.

This series proved to fans that despite the differences in the standings, the Yankees are still very much in it. Hopefully, we will see these two face off again this year in the playoffs, but there is still a lot more baseball to play before that happens.