NEW YORK -- As Aaron Judge’s final crack of the bat soared toward the gap in left-center field, much was hanging in the balance.

Sunday’s finale would decide whether the Yankees won their four-game series against the Major League-leading Rays, or split it. Whether they took a 4-3 lead over Tampa Bay in the season series, or dropped to 3-4. Whether they would move to within six games of the Rays in the American League East, or fall to eight games back.

There were two outs. Bottom of the ninth inning. One-run game. Judge swung on the first pitch he saw.

The ball left his bat at an exit velocity of 111.9 mph. It traveled a Statcast-projected 399 feet. It would have been a home run in 19 MLB ballparks.

And yet, when it landed, the only object it made contact with was the glove of Rays center fielder Jose Siri, standing in the middle of the warning track. Tampa Bay closer Jason Adam could hardly believe it.

Just like that, the Yankees were resigned to an 8-7 loss, their attempt at a third straight comeback having been cut inches short.

“I hit it good, but off the bat, just hit it too high,” Judge said. “Especially with how deep it is out there, [I was] kind of praying for a miracle once it got up there.”

Adam was likely praying for the opposite.

“I thought it was 30 rows deep,” Adam said. “But thankfully, [Judge] missed it more than I thought.”

For the Yankees (23-19), that turn of events was a microcosm of how tightly they have played the Rays (31-11) this season, despite the fact that the two teams have started the year in very different directions. Out of the seven games they’ve played in the past 10 days, only one was decided by a margin of more than one run.

“This is great baseball. It’s competitive baseball. Couldn’t ask for more,” said Yankees center fielder Harrison Bader. “… It’s a blast playing against those guys. They do a lot of things well, as do we. And when I kind of reflect on the last two series, I think one play in either direction for either team really decides a lot of those games.”

Bader seemingly had one of those game-changing plays in the fifth, when the 2021 National League Gold Glover robbed Randy Arozarena of a bases-clearing hit, sprinting 91 feet into that same left-center-field gap and laying out to make a remarkable catch. He reduced Arozarena’s long drive to a game-tying sacrifice fly.

“Just watching his swings, I had a feeling of where I wanted to position myself on the field to defend against both alleys, which is pretty much just straight up,” Bader said. “Got a good beat on it and just tried to reel it in.”

It proved to be for naught, however, when two batters later, Albert Abreu -- who had entered the game in relief of starter Clarke Schmidt -- yielded a grand slam to the first batter he faced on the fourth straight changeup he threw, allowing Taylor Walls to cap the Rays’ five-run fifth and give them their decisive advantage.

“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 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.”

The Yankees clawed their way back, first with an RBI single from Judge in the seventh and then with a two-run homer from Anthony Volpe in the eighth. But they couldn’t finish it off in the ninth.

Though it may only be mid-May, the new, balanced schedule introduced this season as part of the collective bargaining agreement signed in 2022 means that the Yankees will have five fewer games against the Rays and the rest of their division foes. The two sides won’t meet again until July 31.

Still, the Yankees take confidence in the fact that even if there’s some distance in the standings, on the field, they aren’t far behind the Rays.

“That’s what this team’s made of,” Judge said. “We did that a lot last year, had some big comeback victories, and this year is no different. We’re never out of any ballgame, no matter what the score is.”