1. The Subway Series ends in a tie. After losing two of three to the Mets at Citi Field in May, the Yankees took two of three at Yankee Stadium to end the 2026 Subway Series at three games apiece. The Yankees held on to beat the Mets 6-4 on Friday, got blown out 12-2 on Saturday and won a 2-0 game on Sunday that featured six total hits.

2. Friday’s win included a three-run home run from Cody Bellinger and a solo home run from Ben Rice as the Yankees’ offense went 13-for-34 with one walk and seven strikeouts. They took a 1-0 lead in the first, had a 4-1 lead after two and a 5-1 lead after five and managed to hold on as the Mets scored three runs and put eight runners on in the final three innings.

3. The biggest takeaway from the series-opening win was the performance of Carlos Rodon: 6.1 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 8 K. Rodon hasn’t allowed more than three earned runs in a start this season and has a 1.86 ERA over his last six starts and 29 innings. As I wrote going into the series, the Mets had been playing much better of late, especially their offense, so it’s not like Rodon stifled the White Sox or Reds.

4. Rodon’s performance was important because Gerrit Cole was once again a disaster the next day. After allowing three consecutive home runs to begin his start in San Diego last Sunday, Cole allowed a leadoff home run to Francisco Lindor on Saturday. Cole allowed one run in the first, two in the second, one in the third and another in the fifth. He couldn’t get through the fifth, lasted just 4 1/3 innings and gave up nine hits, including three home runs.

5. Cole is a problem. A big problem. Because the Yankees trust him implicitly, no matter how poorly he pitches. He’s going to start either Game 1 or Game 2 of the postseason because of his name and reputation and not because of his recent performance. I can’t believe I’m about to write this, but I trust Rodon more than I trust Cole. There’s a good chance Cole ruins October and the Yankees’ season.

6. If Cole doesn’t, the Yankees’ lineup against left-handed pitching may. The Yankees are going to play Heliot Ramos and Amed Rosario against a left-handed starter. One of Ben Rice or Luis Garcia won’t play, and possibly both, the way they were both held out of the lineup on Saturday. The Red Sox will use Payton Tolle and Ranger Suarez in a three-game series, meaning unless the Wild Card Series lasts two games, the Yankees will play without their optimal lineup for the majority of the series.

7. All of the platooning is tiresome. I wish the Yankees just had one lineup they would deploy no matter what hand the opposing pitcher throws with, but unfortunately, that’s not going to happen. They are going to sit some of the best bats on the team in the postseason (and weaken their defense in the process), and it just seems so unnecessary.

8. Cam Schlittler shut up Mets fans who were excited about their team’s 10-run rout on Sunday.

“It was a little frustrating yesterday, just hearing all the Mets chants,” Schlittler said. “I wanted to make sure I came in here today and shut that down.”

Schlittler threw six scoreless, one-hit innings to lower his ERA to 1.95 on the season. The single-season starting-pitcher ERA in Yankees history every Yankees fan knows is Ron Guidry’s 1.74 from 1978, which has always seemed so ridiculously insane and untouchable, and Schlittler won’t get that low with just two starts (at most) left this season, but finishing with a sub-2.00 ERA over a full season of starts (he’s at 31) is ridiculous.

9. There has been growing talk of Schlittler as the American League MVP and when you look at the seasons in which Clayton Kershaw and Justin Verlander won MVP awards, it’s not crazy (though I don’t think he will win).

What was crazy were Aaron Judge’s comments when asked about Schlittler winning MVP.

“He’s definitely pitching like an MVP, but they’ve got a Cy Young Award for a reason – best pitcher in the game,” Judge said. “So he’s got my vote, definitely, for the Cy Young.”

OK, Judge.

10. “The expectation is to make the playoffs, and the expectation is to win a championship,” Schlittler said. “We’re in a good spot if we keep playing the way we’re playing.”

The Yankees are going to the playoffs. But this has never been about just going to the playoffs, it’s about where you are when you get there, and right now, the Yankees remain four games in back of the Rays for the AL East after the Rays swept the scumbag Astros over the weekend. Before the Subway Series began, the Yankees were three back in the division, and I wrote they needed to cut another game off that deficit in the next nine games before the four-game series against the Rays at the Stadium later this month. Now they need to cut two games off this week to avoid having to sweep the Rays.

1. There were six homegrown Yankees in the lineup on Thursday for the series finale against the Rockies, and a seventh on the bench in Aaron Judge. The six who played led the Yankees to a 10-3 win behind a three-hit night from Spencer Jones and a three-hit night from Anthony Volpe.

2. Here is what I wrote about Volpe last week:

Anthony Volpe will be back. He will most likely be back as the team’s second baseman next season, and I would actually be OK with that. At second base, I would be OK with him being given a chance there. I wouldn’t be OK with him being given years or even a year there. I would treat him like every other player in team history has been treated other than him: perform and you will play. I would be extremely quick to pull the plug if it’s not working out after two months. I have no doubts he can field the position with the shorter throw to first, but he has to improve his hitting to league average.

Well, we didn’t have to wait until next season. After more than a month in Triple-A, Volpe was back in the bigs on Thursday, playing second base and batting ninth: two places he should have been all along. Volpe went 3-for-4 with a home run and five RBIs. The home run (a grand slam) was just his second of the season, as he accumulated 21 percent of his RBIs in 2026 in one night.

3. The home run was his ninth in his last 18 games between Triple-A and the majors. An insane run for a player with limited offensive ability, let alone power. When Jasson Dominguez said earlier this week that Volpe had turned into Barry Bonds, he wasn’t wrong. (Let’s just hope he’s Pirates Bonds and not Giants Bonds.)

4. I wasn’t too happy when Thursday’s lineup was posted without Judge’s name, but I guess 15 innings was too much for someone who needs as much playing time as he can possibly accumulate over the next two-plus weeks. I was mostly upset that Judge wasn’t playing on a day in which the Rays had already lost to cut the division deficit to three games. But the Rockies are so bad (a .377 winning percentage) that they couldn’t stop Volpe and the Judge-less Yankees.

5. “I wanted to get a lot out of it,” Volpe said of being sent down to Triple-A. “You have a game every night to try out different stuff and feel what works. You feel like it’s going to translate in case an opportunity like this comes. So there was just a lot of trial and error.”

Now imagine if the Yankees had sent Volpe down much earlier in his career instead of forcing him to play a position he couldn’t handle and continuing to have him try to hit pitching he couldn’t hit. Again, this was one game. One game against the worst team in baseball. (Let’s see how he looks against the Mets’ starters this weekend.) And it was three hits, two of which got through the infield and the other of which would have also been a home run only in Houston. There are four years and more than 2,000 plate appearances suggesting Volpe didn’t have the light bulb go off in a couple weeks of Triple-A play, but here’s to wishing he did so the Yankees can have a second baseman of the future to go along with their shortstop and center fielder of the future.

6. Max Fried was shaky, lacked control and threw too many pitches with a limited pitch count, only lasting 3 1/3 innings. Fried needed 80 pitches to get 10 outs against a Rockies lineup that made Will Warren look like Cam Schlittler on Wednesday. Fried has three starts left to get completely built up and figure things out before he starts either Game 3 of the Wild Card Series (if necessary) or Game 3 of the ALDS.

7. Michael Fulmer, John Schreiber, Ryan Yarbrough, Brent Headrick (the game was close at one point) and Luis Gil combined for 5 2/3 scoreless innings. With each scoreless appearance from Fulmer and Schreiber, it’s becoming more and more likely the duo will be a part of the bullpen for the postseason. It’s also becoming more and more likely Gil won’t be a part of it.

8.. Next up is the second half of the Subway Series with the Yankee Stadium portion. The Mets’ season has been a disaster, but they are playing much better of late and are currently riding a four-game winning streak. This is all the Mets have left in 2026. This is their postseason and their World Series. Once this weekend ends, the Mets will go back to counting down the games and days and outs left in their miserable year. Not only is it the Mets’ postseason, but their rotation is lined up as if it were with their three best starters going this weekend. It will be Nolan McLean against Carlos Rodon, Zac Thornton against Gerrit Cole and Christian Scott against Cam Schlittler.

9. The door for the division is still open thanks to the Rays’ loss on Thursday, and three games back with 16 to play is doable, simply because of the four head-to-head games remaining. While the Subway Series is played in the Bronx, the Rays will be hosting the Astros in Tampa. The Astros have a three-game lead in the West and are just a half-game behind the White Sox for a first-round bye. A big weekend against the Mets is a near-guarantee to cutting into the Rays’ lead even more.

10. The Yankees need to erase at least one more game from the deficit over their next nine games against the Mets, Twins and Diamondbacks while the Rays are playing the Astros, Athletics and Red Sox. At minimum, take one more off during those three series and the deficit will be two when the teams meet in the Bronx in less than two weeks. It starts with reminding the Mets just how bad their season has been.

1. After a wasted week on the West Coast, the Yankees are finally doing what good teams are supposed to do: beat bad teams. It wasn’t easy defeating the Rockies on Tuesday, but it was a little easier on Wednesday in a 6-1 win.

Luis Garcia gave the Yankees a 1-0 lead with a solo home run in the second inning and George Lombard Jr. blew the game open with a grand slam in the third, becoming the youngest Yankee other than Mickey Mantle to hit a grand slam. It was the Yankees’ first grand slam of the season in Game 145.

2. “It was a big swing to put us in front,” Lombard Jr. said, “and give us a good lead so we could win today.”

Cody Bellinger also added a solo home run as the Yankees went 7-for-31 with three walks and six strikeouts. Aaron Judge owns Tomoyuki Sugano, so when he struck out swinging against the Rockies’ right-hander in the first inning, it was as clear a sign as there could be that Judge is rusty. Judge did go on to pick up two hits in the game before being removed for a pinch runner in the eighth inning.

3. Will Warren went six innings and allowed just one earned run. Warren had given the Yankees just one quality start from the end of May through late August and now has given them two in his last two starts in wins over the Red Sox and Rockies. Warren mentioned “when it wasn’t going good there for a minute” when talking about his season, and I’m not sure how long Warren considers a minute to be since he had a 5.92 ERA over a two-month period. John Schreiber (who hasn’t allowed a hit in 4 1/3 innings as a Yankee), Paul Blackburn and Michael Fulmer pitched three scoreless innings in relief.

4. Unfortunately, the fraudulent Braves were beaten handily for a second straight day by the Rays, so the Yankees’ division deficit remains at four games. The Yankees have gone 15-7 over the last three weeks and have picked up 1 1/2 games in the standings. They desperately need to sweep the Rockies and have the Braves salvage the final game of their series against the Rays.

5. The biggest news of the day came when it was announced Jazz Chisholm would go on the injured list with a thumb injury and Anthony Volpe would be recalled. Volpe started to really hit a little over a week ago at Triple-A, while playing second base, so this call-up seems to at least be deserved. But for the fans who think Volpe figured something out in a week after struggling for four years, don’t be fooled. There are 2,080 major-league plate appearances of data to Volpe’s name. A hot week in the final week of the Triple-A season doesn’t erase four years of being the worst everyday player in Major League Baseball.

6. Would it be great if Volpe did figure something out, mashed in the majors, took playing time away from Chisholm and became the Yankees’ second baseman of the future? Yes, it would be amazing. But I’m going to need to see more than the limited schedule remaining this season to believe Volpe has figured anything out other than owning the sixth tool: having the front office believe in you to no end.

7. It will be interesting to see how the Yankees construct their postseason roster. These names are givens:

1. Aaron Judge
2. Ben Rice
3. Luis Garcia
4. Cody Bellinger
5. Spencer Jones
6. Ryan McMahon
7. Paul Goldschmidt
8. Heliot Ramos
9. Jazz Chisholm
10. Jose Caballero
11. Austin Wells
12. Ali Sanchez
13. Cam Schlittler
14. Gerrit Cole
15. Max Fried
16. Carlos Rodon
17. David Bednar
18. Brent Headrick
19. Paul Blackburn
20. Tim Hill

Does Warren get on? What about Luis Gil? Do Ryan Weathers and Clarke Schmidt do enough in two-plus weeks as relievers? Will Fernando Cruz be healthy? Have Schreiber and Fulmer done enough? Will Trent Grisham come back? Could Jasson Dominguez be a pinch runner? Would the Yankees leave Amed Rosario off? Could Volpe push himself into the equation? There are more than 30 options for 26 spots.

The Yankees carried 14 position players and 12 pitchers for the ALDS last year. Obviously, the Wild Card Series is weird in that it’s a best-of-3, so you don’t need as many starting options, and the ALDS is the “real” postseason roster.

8. I think it’s obvious Jones is the team’s starting center fielder even if Grisham does come back. Jones has an .854 OPS since July 29. He hits, hits for power, draws walks, has speed and is athletic, all traits Grisham doesn’t possess.

9. I also think Ryan McMahon may be playing himself out of a starting spot. He has one multi-hit game in the last month and one home run in the last two months. He doesn’t walk and strikes out a lot. He can get his glove on nearly everything, but then struggles to make accurate throws. He has an abysmal on-base percentage and no speed. If Volpe could hit, I would play him at second, move Chisholm back to third and stop playing McMahon. Caballero has been too poor offensively since his May IL stint to make him the starting third baseman. It will be McMahon at third in the playoffs, unless a lefty is starting and then it will be Caballero? Or Rosario? And then we will likely watch what happened in the late-June game at Fenway Park happen again with Rosario at third base in an intense atmosphere. The problem once again is that the Yankees have too many DHs on their team (Rice, Garcia, Ramos, Dominguez) and too many players making too much money to not play (McMahon, Grisham) to construct a logical roster.

10. Thursday’s series finale against the Rockies needs to result in a win. It’s Max Fried against Ryan Feltner. It’s not as lopsided as Tuesday’s pitching matchup was (because Fried will be limited by a pitch count), but it’s close. And because the Mets have their three best starters lined up for the weekend for the second half of the Subway Series, the Yankees can’t lose to the worst team in baseball.

1. Since the end of May, every Yankees fan has been waiting for the team’s best player to return to properly evaluate them and create expectations for October, and that time is now. With the return of Aaron Judge, I guess now the Yankees can be evaluated properly, and after one game, the Yankees are who I envisioned they would be offensively, and that is still a heavily flawed offense.

2. This has nothing to do with Judge, who looked like someone who hasn’t played in a game or seen real pitching in more than three months as he went 0-for-3 with two strikeouts against a pitcher who can’t strike anyone out. (Gabriel Hughes entered Tuesday’s game with only 42 strikeouts in 52 2/3 innings and then struck out six Yankees in five innings.) This has everything to do with the entire lineup sitting around and waiting for Judge to do something to carry them to a win.

3. The Yankees scored one non-defense-aided run in seven innings against Rockies pitching before Heliot Ramos’ three-run home run in the seventh created separation. At the time of Ramos’ home run, the Yankees were clinging to a 2-1 lead over the worst team in Major League Baseball and were one swing away from another Cam Schlittler masterpiece (7 IP, 1 ER, 0 BB, 10 K) being wasted. Thankfully, the one swing that changed the game was Ramos’.

4. As expected, Judge’s return didn’t suddenly turn a lineup full of sub-.700 OPS into a lineup you can trust to hit elite pitching every day in October. Ben Rice went 0-for-2 with a walk, Cody Bellinger went 1-for-4, Luis Garcia Jr. went 2-for-4, Spencer Jones went 0-for-3 with a walk, Jazz Chisholm went 2-for-4, George Lombard Jr. went 1-for-3, Ryan McMahon went 1-for-3 and Austin Wells went 0-for-3. The Yankees went 8-for-30 with three walks and 10 strikeouts. They couldn’t hit the starter Hughes and his 6.19 ERA in 11 career starts, couldn’t touch reliever Mark Manfredi, couldn’t score against reliever Jaden Hill and needed a Brennan Bernardino meltdown to put the game out of reach. It was a frustrating performance even if the final score made it look better than it was.

5. This is nothing new. The Yankees’ offense has been wildly inconsistent all season, both with and without Judge. And once Judge gets more games and plate appearances under him and finds his timing, he will hit, but it doesn’t mean others will follow. After wasting a week on the West Coast during a time when the Rays went 3-4, the Yankees nearly wasted the most lopsided starting pitching matchup of their season against the worst team they will face all season.

6. Here’s what I wrote about Judge’s return and what I expected for a nonsensical load management plan last week:

The Yankees will of course institute some asinine return plan for him like playing a full game in right field and then sitting the next game and then serving as the DH for the next game and then sitting the next game and then playing right field for a full game and so on. The Yankees believe they have figured out a scientific way to beat injuries, and yet, their load plans don’t prevent injuries because injuries happen. It’s idiotic to not play Judge as much as possible when he returns because if Judge is healthy enough to play then he should play every day. He needs at-bats with a limited number of games remaining before October.

Judge was removed early from the game on Tuesday because apparently you’re more prone to injuries late in the game than early in the game.

7. “I feel great,” Judge said. “I played half a game, so I don’t know what to say about that. I respect Boone, so whatever he says, I’m going to do. I’m not happy about it.”

Judge had to have known Boone was going to remove him before the end of the game, so it’s hard to believe he was surprised by the decision. The Yankees will likely continue this charade for the next few games before eventually letting Judge play a full nine innings of baseball.

8. The Yankees’ elimination number dropped to 15 after the Rays’ 7-1 win over the Braves on Tuesday. The division deficit has to be at most what it is now (four games) for the four-game series against the Rays in the Bronx in two weeks, but you would like it to be less so a sweep isn’t mandatory.

9. With Will Warren getting the start on Thursday, the Yankees now have their rotation lined up to have Cam Schlittler, Gerrit Cole, Max Fried and Carlos Rodon start the four games against the Rays. A lot can happen to a rotation in 15 days, but the Yankees at least are planning for the Rays series like it’s a postseason series.

10. It would be nice if the Braves could show up and win the next two against the Rays, but I’ll take even one win from the fraudulent Braves at this point. The Yankees have to sweep this series against the Rockies if they want to keep the division dream alive and avoid playing a best-of-3 against the Red Sox to determine their fate for the second straight season. Sweep the Rockies and get even just one win from the Braves and it’s three games with 16 to go and four head-to-head games remaining.

1. The Yankees were about to waste another Cam Schlittler gem. If Austin Wells’ ground ball doesn’t get through the right side of the infield with two outs in the 10th, the Yankees would have wasted an eight-inning, two-hit, one-run masterpiece from their ace. Because even though the score may have still been tied if Wells had gotten out there, we all know how the bottom of the 10th inning would have played out. (Michael Kay said the Yankees “haven’t had much luck” in extra innings on the road even though their abysmal record has nothing to do with luck.) But instead of adding to their humiliating extra-inning road record since the implementation of the automatic runner, the Yankees scored five runs in the 10th and pulled out a 6-3 win in Anaheim.

2. The Rays lost to the Mets and the Red Sox lost to the Mariners, so the Yankees improved in both the division and wild-card standings. They are now 3 1/2 games in back of the Rays (four in the loss column) and five games up on the Red Sox (six when you factor in the head-to-head tiebreaker). It was an all-around positive late night heading into Thursday’s day off.

3. Schlittler became the first Yankee in franchise history to have 19 starts of one run or fewer, a preposterous stat. The only two hits he allowed over eight innings were both to Vaughn Grissom: a single and a solo home run. He picked up nine strikeouts and lowered his American League-leading ERA to 2.04.

4. Schlittler’s only competition for the AL Cy Young Award is Dylan Cease and I don’t think it’s much of a competition. Schlittler has started three more games than Cease and has him beat in the majority of pitching categories, including the most important ones.

Schlittler: WAR, ERA, WHIP, ERA+, starts, innings, walks and walks per nine innings
Cease: Strikeouts, FIP, hits per nine, home runs per nine and strikeouts per nine

5. I wouldn’t have been able to sleep if the Yankees had lost to the Angels for the fourth time in seven games this season and wasted Schlittler’s effort on a night the Rays lost, considering the Yankees have already wasted and lost these starts from Schlittler this season:

6 IP, 0 ER
6 IP, 2 ER
5 IP, 0 ER
6.1 IP, 1 ER
7 IP, 1 ER
5.1 IP, 1 ER

6. Paul Goldschmidt went 2-for-3 in the leadoff spot and would have been 3-for-3 if not for a dazzling play by former Yankee Oswald Peraza at third base. It’s safe to say Goldschmidt will be leading off against any lefty for the rest of the season, including the postseason. Cody Bellinger went 3-for-5 in the game and 8-for-14 in the series. Heliot Ramos went 0-for-3 (but hit into some bad luck with a line-drive double play). Ben Rice went 2-for-4 and Amed Rosario went 1-for-5. Spencer Jones had a rare bad night going 0-for-4 with four strikeouts as Reid Detmers was able to get Jones to chase breaking pitches away and go after high fastballs. Jose Caballero went 1-for-4. Jazz Chisholm and Ali Sanchez combined to go 0-for-5. Wells went 2-for-2 after entering as a pinch hitter, Trent Grisham went 1-for-2 with a single in the 10th and Luis Garcia went 0-for-2 after entering as a pinch hitter. Garcia would have shouldered a lot of blame for a loss because of his at-bat with the bases loaded in the 10th, if Wells hadn’t picked him up.

7. Wells is a surprising 6-for-14 with two home runs and nine RBIs in his last five games. In those five games, Wells has produced 32 percent of his RBIs for the season. His overall stats for the year are a lost cause, but if he can just be bad and not historically awful for the rest of 2026, it will make a huge difference in the lineup. The Yankees have started to lessen the number of automatic outs in the lineup, and getting Wells to do something productive every once in a while instead of going weeks without reaching base will make the offense that much deeper.

8. I would expect George Lombard Jr. to be back in the lineup on Friday, and if he is, the only missing player will then be Aaron Judge. The Yankees are so close to having their expected position players for the postseason (not including Giancarlo Stanton since it’s hard to envision him being available again this season). The rotation is as good as it’s going to be health-wise since Ryan Weathers will only return as a reliever (if he returns) and Clarke Schmidt is preparing to come back as a reliever. It’s unfortunate the Yankees never had their entire expected roster for a single day in 2026. It’s annoying to think about what their record would be and how many games up in the division they would be if injuries hadn’t impacted Judge, Stanton, Cody Bellinger, Max Fried, Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodon and Ryan Weathers throughout the year. (Rice and Lombard Jr. also missed games without going on the IL, while Caballero, Grisham, Wells and McMahon all went on the IL at some point.)

9. As long as the Yankees are within four games (which they are now) in the loss column when they play the Rays four times from September 22 to September 24, they will have a chance at the division. Ideally, the Yankees would be closer than four games, so they don’t need to sweep the four games in three days, and they have a chance to be closer given the Rays’ upcoming schedule: four at Texas, three at Atlanta and three against Houston. The Rangers are two games back in the West and 1 1/2 games back of the last wild card. The Braves have a four-game lead on the Phillies and are tied in the loss column with the Dodgers for a first-round bye. The Astros have a two-game division lead and would be out of the wild-card race. All three teams are playing for their postseason lives and will give the Rays everything they have.

10. The Yankees head to San Diego where they need to avenge what went on last weekend when the Padres blew two late leads to the Rays. (If not for those meltdowns, the Yankees would be two games back in the loss column.) After the weekend in San Diego, the Yankees have nine games against the Rockies, Mets and Twins. This is their chance to make sure the deficit when they play the Rays is less than the four games it is now.