Yankees can keep partying at ‘rocking’ Stadium with AL East-clinching win over Orioles

Since the last time they met just before the All-Star break, the Yankees and Orioles seemed destined to decide the AL East with a showdown in the final week of September.

That series has finally arrived, though the drama is not as thick as it could have been — not that the Yankees are complaining about it.

With a well-timed September surge, coupled with the Orioles free-falling, the Yankees can clinch the division on Tuesday night with a win — or just one win or one Orioles loss over the final six games of the regular season.

Coming off a 5-1 West Coast trip, which included a champagne-soaked celebration in Seattle for securing a playoff berth, the Yankees can party at home this week by wrapping up the AL East at Yankee Stadium.

“It’s going to be rocking,” Aaron Judge said. “It’s been rocking all summer long and I don’t expect that to change, especially with what we have coming down to the wire here. We got a tough opponent coming in with the Orioles. We just gotta go out there and take care of business and see what happens.”

As soon as the Yankees clinch the division, they will also secure a bye into the ALDS, since they have already guaranteed a better record than the Astros, who are on the verge of winning the AL West.

And the Yankees’ magic number to clinch the best record in the AL, which comes with home-field advantage through the ALCS, is three as they hold a 2 ½-game lead on the Guardians.

“We’d love to get it,” manager Aaron Boone said of the top seed. “We’re going to be playing these games to win. Hopefully we do clinch and hopefully we win this division, first and foremost. But hopefully then we can keep on winning through the week. We certainly understand it’s there to be had and would want that. But you’re always striking the balance between that and making sure guys are in a good spot [physically].”

What could have been an epic showdown with the Orioles had some air taken out of it with the teams trending in opposite directions over the last two weeks.

The Yankees have won 12 of their last 16 while the Orioles have lost 10 of 14, putting the Yankees a season-high six games ahead of the Orioles with six games to play.

While the Yankees are as healthy as they have been all season, which has helped put them in this strong position, the Orioles are limping to the finish line, particularly in their rotation — though they do have Zach Eflin and Corbin Burnes lined up for Wednesday and Thursday.

But the Yankees can make that moot if they win the series opener against Dean Kremer, who has held them to two runs in each of his starts against them this season.

“I know how talented they are and I know how capable they are watching that team come of age the last couple years,” Boone said. “They’ve definitely hit a rough patch here in the second half of the season and recently. I think being banged up has not helped them, obviously.”

The teams took turns leading the division through the first few months of the season, but neither had been able to pull away until the Yankees did recently.

The Orioles’ biggest lead was three games, which they last held on July 9.

A few days after that, the Yankees arrived in Baltimore and nearly pulled off a sweep heading into the All-Star break, only to suffer a brutal ninth-inning collapse behind Clay Holmes.

That gave the Orioles a one-game lead at the break and put them up 6-4 in the season series against the Yankees, which would only matter if the Yankees lose out and the Orioles win out — at which point the tiebreaker would come into play and favor the Orioles for the division title.

But the Yankees’ strong play over the last few weeks has all but ensured that won’t be necessary, opening the door for a celebration in The Bronx this week.

“It’s a really cool opportunity,” said Clarke Schmidt, who will start Tuesday’s series opener in his fourth game back from the injured list. “We’ve obviously had a really good season and the potential to be able to cap it off [by] winning the division is something you can dream about. Really excited. It’s a culmination of a really good year for the team.”