The St. Louis Cardinals travel to Florida's coast to face the Tampa Bay Rays for this first time this season in a three-game series that opens Thursday night.

Saturday's matchup, originally the second contest of the series, was moved to Thursday and became the opener to avoid the conflict of playing at the same time as a preseason game pitting the host Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Buffalo Bills.

That shift is not the seismic one that St. Louis and Tampa Bay need to adjust their mediocre seasons.

Both clubs find themselves ironically in the same situation, and one word comes to mind regarding this interleague series: sweep. That's likely the only acceptable result for these teams with the clock ticking on their respective seasons.

The Rays are five games under .500 through 127 contests and

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