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The best rivalry in baseball hasn’t been a rivalry at all this year, with the Boston Red Sox having won all eight matchups with the New York Yankees. But the four-game series starting Thursday between the AL East rivals might be more important to Boston than New York.

That’s because the Red Sox were just swept by the Tampa Bay Rays, with Boston falling 2.5 games behind the Yanks in the division and now holding just a three-game lead over the Rays in the chase for the wild card.

The Red Sox are 8-10 since the All-Star break and will be a bit shorthanded for at least the first two games of the Yankees series. Left fielder Jason Bay, who homered in Wednesday’s loss to Tampa Bay, re-injured his right hamstring during the game expects to miss at least the first two against the Yankees.

Bay, hitting.252 with 21 homers and 75 RBIs, had returned to the lineup after missing two games with a mildly strained hamstring. But he left the game after aggravating the injury running out a grounder in the eighth inning.

The Yankees are rolling, having just swept Toronto. The Yankees have the best record in the AL, and since they were swept by the Red Sox in early June, they are 31-16.

However, Alex Rodriguez is just 1-for-10 with two strikeouts this year against the Red Sox, and he hasn’t homered in 15 games. Yanks closer Mariano Rivera surrendered four hits and two runs in 1.1 innings in his lone appearance against Boston this year, but Rivera hasn’t allowed any runs since the All-Star break.

Boston, meanwhile, has added Cleveland’s Victor Martinez since the Yankees and Boston last played, and Martinez has 10 hits in his first 21 at-bats.

The Yanks have opened as -186 betting favorites for tonight’s opener behind Joba Chamberlain (7-2, 3.58 ERA). Chamberlain has been rolling of late, going 3-0 with a 0.83 ERA since the All-Star break. However, he probably won’t pitch more than six innings tonight as he is on an innings count.

Boston counters with struggling John Smoltz (2-4, 7.12 ERA). He has allowed six homers in his last three starts spanning 16 2-3 innings; he has allowed 17 runs in that span.

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