Season Over: Blue Jays Finish off Yankees in ALDS

The Yankees teased us Tuesday night with a dramatic win to stay alive, and then they completely shit the bed with a loathsome performance Wednesday and the Toronto Blue Jays - a team that I can’t possibly hate any more than I do - is moving on to the ALCS while the Yankees’ World Series drought reaches 16 years. Lets get to it. 

Well, I was right.

Not that I’m happy about it, but like I wrote the other day following that two-game embarrassment in Toronto, and what I wrote at numerous points during the regular season, this was the ending I long expected for the Yankees this season.

After a dramatic, season-saving victory Tuesday night, the Yankees melted down in Game 4 Wednesday and fell 5-2 to the Blue Jays which brought the AL Divisional Series, and their season, to a crushing end.

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“The ending’s the worst, right?” Aaron Boone said. “This was a team that played for one another. It’s a beat up room in there. We got beat here. They beat us this series, simple as that. Doesn’t make it any easier; they took it to us this series, simple as that. It’s hard to win the World Series. I’ve been chasing it all my life.”

Boone has said all year that he believed this was the best of the eight Yankees teams he has managed - many of us would say mis-managed, right? In many ways that was probably true because this roster was a little better, top to bottom, than several of the teams they’ve trotted out.

It was definitely better than the 2024 team that made it to Game 5 of the World Series. But once again it was a team that was not good enough because like so many past iterations in the Boone era, there were just too many days and nights where the Yankees did not play crisp, winning baseball, and in the end that always costs you. The little things matter so much in baseball, and year after year, it’s the little things that always tank the Yankees.

And all those little things piled up and became big things from late May through late August when they played such piss poor baseball and allowed the Blue Jays - a team I can honestly say I hate more than even the Red Sox - to soar past them in the AL East.

The Yankees wasted a 7.5-game lead and by Aug. 23 they were 6.5 back thanks to those three-plus months where they blew so many games and while they finished strong and nearly came all the way back to steal the division, they ran out of time.

It was ludicrous that the Yankees scored the most runs in MLB, hit the most homers, had the highest slugging percentage and OPS, and had a team starting rotation ERA that was nearly a run better than the Blue Jays, yet they did not finish ahead of Toronto.

Yes, they ended up with the same record at 94-68, but the season series went to the Blue Jays so that tiebreaker meant the Blue Jays won the division and had the first-round bye, plus homefield advantage in the Divisional Series and obviously, that made a huge difference given that the Yankees finished 1-8 in that hell hole they call Rogers Centre.

Props for rallying to beat the Red Sox in the Wildcard Series, but it was galling that the Yankees were no match for the Blue Jays who outscored New York 34-19 in the four games, and it was even more galling that Vladimir Guerrero and George Springer - the two faces of evil -celebrated at Yankee Stadium with “New York, New York” playing in the clubhouse during their champagne party.

“Just a hard year,” Boone said. “There were just some tough moments, but also like in a lot of ways very rewarding to go through some of the moments we went through in the middle of the season especially. To see this kind of team come together in a really special way, and I feel like we got so much better in the final couple months of the season.”

It sucks when a season ends, because we all love baseball so much and now there are no more Yankees games to watch. I could be snarky and say that’s good because now all of our blood pressures will return to normal, but that’s not true. It sucks that it’s over more than three weeks earlier than 2024 when they gave us a wild ride all the way to the World Series.

But as I said at the top, I can’t say that I’m surprised because even with a better roster than any other that Boone has had, this team wasn’t winning a championship, and it didn’t, and none other than Alex Rodriguez laid out why.

“Honestly, from the entire organization, (Boone) is the guy I would circle that is the least to be blamed,” Rodriguez said on the FOX postgame show. “He’s got a lot of talent, but for me, personally, one of the worst constructions of a roster I’ve ever seen. You have three left-handed catchers, you have five DHs, you have a first baseman in and out. It’s just a very difficult hand for Boone. And honestly, they were exposed against a much better Jays team.”

Oct. 7: Yankees 9, Blue Jays 6

➤ It wound up not meaning shit in the end, but wow, at least we got this unbelievable game to enjoy. It was wild, wacky, poorly played at times by both teams, brilliantly played at other times, and filled with indelible moments that turned it into an instant classic. Of course, had the Yankees lost, all I would have said is that this game sucked! But they didn’t. They lived to fight another day, even if on that day they turtled.

➤ For the first 2 ½ innings it was sheer misery and it certainly looked like the Yankees were a couple hours away from extinction. Carlos Rodon was brutal, shrinking in a huge spot as he gave up six earned runs on six hits and two walks and when he walked off the field in the third, the Yankees had been outscored 29-8 to that point in the series. It wasn’t all Rodon’s fault because the Yankees decided to conjure memories of Game 5 of the 2024 World Series by looking like clowns in the field, even though they weren’t officially charged with an error. Still, the lefty was not good.

➤ In the first inning, pretty much the last thing you’d want to do is throw a ball anywhere near the strike zone to Guerrero. Rodon did that, and what made it worse is that he walked Davis Schneider before Guerrero launched another moon shot for a 2-0 lead. Unbelievable this god damn fat ass. The Yankees got one back in their half thanks to old friend Isiah Kiner-Falefa booting a Ben Rice grounder that would have been the third out. Judge had singled and he took second on that muff, then scored on Giancarlo Stanton’s RBI single.

➤ In the third, the Yankees crumbled. Schneider doubled so Rodon wisely intentionally walked Guerrero. After an out, he got tagged for three straight singles by Daulton Varsho, Ernie Clement and Anthony Santander which produced four runs. What a disaster. Varsho hit a blooper that Cody Bellinger should have made a sliding catch on, but he dropped it. Schneider had to hold up, but then when the ball was thrown to Jazz Chisholm at second, the knucklehead fell asleep so Schneider took off home and scored. Brutal in every way. Guerrero then scored on Clement’s single on a close play at the plate as Bellinger nearly threw him out. Finally, Santander ripped a two-run single to right as Judge didn’t even try to throw out Clement at the plate. That made it 6-1 and it sure felt over.

➤ Instead, Fernando Cruz began what became an outstanding night for the bullpen by getting the final two outs of the inning, and the Yankees began their comeback in the bottom half as Trent Grisham doubled and scored on a Judge double, and after a Bellinger singled, Judge scored on Stanton’s sac fly. OK, halfway back at 6-3.

➤ Then came the fourth where the Yankees Stadium ghosts decided to show up. Austin Wells reached when Addison Barger dropped his pop fly down the left-field line for an error, and Grisham walked so Blue Jays manager John Schneider yanked Shane Bieber and brought in perhaps his best reliever, Louie Varland, to face Judge. He got ahead 0-2, then threw a 100 mph heater well off the plate inside trying to get Judge to chase. Judge did, but he put an amazing swing on the ball and sent it soaring into the night down the line in left where it clanged off the pole for a tying three-run homer. That’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for from Judge, an iconic swing that brought bedlam to the Bronx.

➤ However, it was only the fourth inning and the Yankees bullpen still had to get 15 more outs and given how they’ve performed most of the year, that didn’t seem possible. Until it was. Cruz and Camilo Doval had already gotten through the fourth, then Doval and Tim Hill made it through the fifth, Hill took the sixth by himself, and by then the Yankees were in the lead.

➤ Chisholm, who had been pretty lousy in the postseason, crushed an upper deck homer to right off Varland in the fifth for what proved to be the winning run, pretty much the only thing he did in this series. Braydon Fisher relieved and Amed Rosario doubled and later scored on a Wells single to make it 8-6, though Wells was gunned down at second for the final out. No worries, though. The Yankees tacked on a run in the sixth as Judge was intentionally walked with one out and no one on base and he came around to score as Bellinger doubled and Ben Rice hit a sac fly that made it 9-6.

➤ Devin Williams pitched an easy seventh, then came out for a second inning for the first time all year, giving up a single and getting a big strikeout of Santander before turning it over to David Bednar. He needed just five pitches to get the last two outs of the eighth, and only 16 to get through the ninth, Guerrero making the last out when Jose Caballaro made a diving play at third and threw his ass out.

➤ Teams had previously been 0-38 in MLB postseason history when down by five or more runs and in danger of being swept in a multi-game series. Cool piece of history. Meant nothing 24 hours later.

What they said in Tuesday’s clubhouse

• Judge on his home run: “I guess a couple ghosts in Monument Park helped keep that fair. After he blew my doors off on (the previous pitch) I said, ‘Hey, just be ready. See a good pitch and drive it.’ I get yelled at for swinging at them out of the zone, but now I’m getting praised for it. It’s a game. I don’t care what the numbers say or where something was at. I’m just up there trying to put a good swing on a good pitch. It looked good to me. When the ball is in the air, it’s kind of silent. You’ve got a lot of unknown. But then right when it hits the pole, I’m looking straight at my teammates - all the guys that have been battling with me all year long, battling for this moment.”

• Williams on the standing ovation he received: “It’s nice to feel appreciated sometimes. That was definitely a lot better than what I’ve heard for much of the year.”

• Cruz on the bullpen: “Stop the bleeding. We attacked them and let our guys do the job.”

• Ryan McMahon on the early deficit: “I think a couple of guys were pissed off, man. I think it kind of kicked us in the butt and got us locked in.”

Oct. 8: Blue Jays 5, Yankees 2

➤ What a shit show this was from start to finish, a combination of choke artist batting, a humongous, boneheaded error that basically decided the game, and a very good starting pitcher performance ruined by a Blue Jays team that while, yes, came up with the hits when they had to have them, also were so god damn lucky all night that it was sickening.

➤ Cam Schlittler did not have the same juice he had against the Red Sox and that was clear in the first inning when he gave up three hits and a run when Springer led off with a double and came around to score when fat ass Guerrero hit an excuse me single just inside the right field line. Addison Barger also singled, but Schlittler got the next two men to limit the damage so you’re thinking OK, that could have been worse.

➤ After leaving a man on base in the first and second innings, the Yankees tied it on Ryan McMahon’s solo homer in the third, but thereafter, the Yankees offense was absolutely pathetic. The Blue Jays kept rolling out reliever after reliever in a full bullpen game, eight in all, and the Yankees never did another thing until a meaningless run in the ninth.

➤ While the Yankees were doing nothing but taking called strikes before eventually making harmless outs, the Blue Jays just hen-pecked them to death. The fifth was terrible because the 8-9 hitters, Clement and Andres Gimenez, hit back-to-back singles. Clement had a series that was simply unbelievable as the Yankees could not get him out. But Gimenez? That guy can’t hit a lick, so that was ridiculous. Springer immediately plated Clement with a sac fly to make it 2-1, but Schlittler again did well to keep it right there.

➤ Then came the disgusting seventh when the Blue Jays put it away. Again it was Clement starting it with a one-out single but then Schlitter got Gimenez to hit a grounder right to Chisholm for should have been an inning-ending double play. Instead, Jazz booted it so it was second and third with the top of order coming up. Boone brought in Williams which was the right move, and he whiffed Springer for the second out. But then Nathan Lukes - Nathan friggin’ Lukes - ripped a two-run single and that was all she wrote.

➤ They tacked on another run in the eighth against Camilo Doval, and then we were all treated to the Yankees fake rally in the bottom half which netted zero runs. With two outs, Stanton singled and Chisholm and Rice walked to load the bases. Here was the chance to get back into it, and to the surprise of no one, Wells swung at the first pitch he saw from closer Jeff Hoffman and flied to center. Honestly, did you really expect anything to happen there?

➤ In the ninth, Boone finally realized how awful Anthony Volpe is so he pinch hit Jasson Dominguez who laced a double and he eventually scored on a two-out single by Judge, but Bellinger - who began slumping in mid-September and never came out of it - whiffed to end the season.

➤ Volpe struck out in 14 of his last 18 plate appearances and had a .200 OPS for the series. Yes, he made a few nice plays in the field, but his bat was a tragedy all season. Stanton, Chisholm, Rice, Wells and Grisham all had OPS’ of under .700, too, so it was a team-wide failure. The 2

➤ The exception was Judge who was brilliant and I would think has changed the narrative on his past October failures. He went 13-for-26 across the two series and while he had just the one home run, he became the second player in history to have a postseason with at least a .500 average, .575 on-base, .and 675 slug. The other was Manny Ramirez in 2008. Judge was 9-for-15 in the ALDS while the rest of the team was 25-for-121, a putrid .207 average.

What they said in Wednesday’s clubhouse

• Chisholm on his killer error: “Didn’t think it was going to play the way it played. Been thinking about that since the play happened. Still thinking about it now. At the end of the day, we got to move on eventually. I got three months to move on now. I’m probably going to be thinking about this when the season starts next year.”

• Judge: “This is a team game, so we didn’t win as a team. You lose as a team. There’s definitely more I can do. I’ll figure it out and go back to work.”

• Boone on Schlittler: “I thought he was good. He didn’t have the dominant swing-and-miss stuff. I thought he pitched really effectively and was filling up the strike zone. I thought he made a lot of key pitches when he needed to, mixed well.”

See you in the spring, I guess.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I will be doing some season wrapup newsletters in the next few weeks, and Battling Bronx Bombers - which is only available if you have a Mighty Networks online account, so click that icon up top to join - still has a few more weeks to go.

Otherwise, this is the last series recap of the year. Thanks to everyone for reading. As you know, I put an absurd amount of work into this, and you get it for free, so I hope you’ve appreciated it again this year.