1. The Yankees are the best team in the American League, but the combination of injuries, poor roster construction and their annual summer vacation cost them the division for a second straight season. They lost Giancarlo Stanton for “24 hours” at the end of April and he hasn’t played since. They lost Aaron Judge for 96 games. Cody Bellinger, Jazz Chisholm, Jose Caballero, Austin Wells and Ryan McMahon each landed on the injured list, while Trent Grisham, Max Fried and Carlos Rodon all landed on it twice. They let Camilo Doval and Jake Bird blow games and spent another half-season trying to sell the world on Anthony Volpe as a shortstop. They suffered a midseason slump with bad summer series losses to the Reds, Tigers and Twins, but nothing was worse than getting swept in a four-game series by the Red Sox at Fenway Park. That series is why the Yankees are playing the Red Sox in the Wild Card Series for the second straight season.

2. The Yankees went into that June 25-28 series with the Red Sox with a three-game division lead. The Red Sox were 32-46, had fired their manager, were 15 1/2 games out in the division and in last place in the AL. In the first game of that series, the Yankees had a 2-0 lead in the fifth inning with Cam Schlittler on the mound adding to his career domination of the Red Sox. The Red Sox were on their way to falling 15 games under .500. Their season was over. At least until the Yankees pulled out the defibrillators on defense and brought the Red Sox back to life. A comedy of errors led the Red Sox to a 6-3 win. Schlittler allowed no earned runs with nine strikeouts over five innings and took the loss. The Red Sox won the next day, and the next day and the next day and kept on winning, ripping off a 32-5 run to turn their season around. The 15 1/2-game lead the Yankees had over the Red Sox eventually dwindled down to a half-game, but thankfully, the Red Sox never passed the Yankees in the standings or the venue for the games this week would be Fenway Park and not Yankee Stadium.

3. The Yankees have no one to blame other than themselves for having to play in the best-of-3 Wild Card Series for a second straight year. They have no one to blame other than themselves for the Red Sox — the one AL team that possesses their kryptonite with an abundance of left-handed pitching — being their opponent. Like last year, if the Yankees were to play the Red Sox in a best-of-5, my confidence would be much greater than it is now, even without Judge and with Stanton relegated to a one-at-bat-at-most-per-game role. If the Yankees had to play them in a best-of-7, my confidence would be through the roof. But in a three-game series? I don’t know if there is any measurable confidence in a best-of-3. Just like there wasn’t last year when the Yankees eked out a series win with Judge and Stanton against a Red Sox roster inferior to this year’s.

That’s not because the Yankees are an inferior team. Quite the opposite. When they’re not beating themselves, the Yankees are a much better team than the Red Sox, even without Judge and Stanton. It’s because it’s a BEST-OF-3 SERIES. The Yankees lost three-game series this season to the Athletics, Orioles, Blue Jays, Reds, Tigers, Twins and Cardinals. The Rockies swept the Red Sox in a three-game series this year. It’s three games! The margin for error is slim and for the Aaron Boone Yankees who have always played as if their margin for error is infinite, it’s not an ideal setting. After Tuesday night, one team will be on the brink of elimination.

4. I have to believe Cam Schlittler will dominate the Red Sox like he always has in Game 1. I can’t entertain thoughts that he could be tired, that he’s due for a clunker against a team he has dominated or that he could get outpitched by Payton Tolle, even if it’s very conceivable he could get outpitched by Tolle. Tolle is the Red Sox’ Schlittler, just left-handed and smilier and fatter with a mustache. The Yankees had 46 plate appearances against Tolle in 2026 and went 4-for-43 with three walks, 18 strikeouts and a .093/.152/.163 slash line. The Yankees scored one run against Tolle in 13 innings and that one run was a Jazz Chisholm home run at Fenway Park around Pesky’s Pole. Last season, Garrett Crochet (who is on the Red Sox’ Wild Card Series roster) made four starts against the Yankees and the Red Sox won all of them with Crochet allowing just four walks and recording 39 strikeouts in 27 1/3 innings, and yet, Tolle has been more dominant against the Yankees.

If there is offense while Schlittler and Tolle are in the game, it’s likely to come from a home run. Schlittler and Tolle combined for 342 1/3 innings and only allowed 252 hits. It’s nearly impossible to envision either of them allowing a series of consecutive hits to plate runs. Only 31 of the 1,364 combined hitters they faced hit home runs, but the 2.3 percent chance that someone gets a mistake over the short porch is the only believable way the duo would allow a run (or runs) to be scored on Tuesday. For two starters who walk few, strike out many and rarely allow hits, let alone home runs, hitting a mistake out is the best and may be the only chance to score.

5. Fortunately, the Yankees are much better at hitting home runs than the Red Sox. The Yankees were second in the majors in home runs (three fewer than the Astros) in a season in which Judge missed 96 games and Stanton missed 138. The Red Sox were 26th in the majors in home runs. If the long ball is the path to generating offense and being the difference in a game started by two pitchers who both own the opposition, the Yankees’ lineup is better constructed to do so. (Now watch some bum like Nick Sogard hit one out in Game 1.)

6. But that’s about where the positivity on lineup construction ends for the Yankees. As of Tuesday morning — the morning of the start of the postseason — the Yankees’ postseason roster was mostly unknown and only three of nine lineup spots were set in stone: left field (Cody Bellinger), shortstop (George Lombard Jr.) and catcher (Austin Wells). The Yankees are a team full of mostly designated hitters, built like an autodrafted fantasy team. They have three possible first basemen: one who can’t hit righties, one who can’t hit lefties and one who can’t field. They have three possible second basemen: one who has all the talent in the world but is mentally fragile and a postseason disaster, one who is pesky but reckless and one who just started playing the position in August. They have four options at third base: one who is owed a lot of money but is the worst non-catcher offensive player in the sport, one who is an extreme liability and the reason the Red Sox won that Schlittler start to save their season in June, one who is the pesky-but-reckless option from second base and one who is the second base option that just started playing second and also just started playing third. In center field, they can either play a rookie who can’t field, strikes out a ton, but can hit home runs or a veteran who can’t run and can’t hit postseason pitching, but has good plate discipline. In right field, it’s either move the rookie center fielder to right or the all-world left fielder to right or play the guy who mashes left-handed pitching but fields like he’s drunk or blindfolded (or both).

7. Not having a one-size-fits-all lineup like championship teams have or even a set lineup for lefties and righties means a lot of crucial, season-changing decisions have to be made from what the starting lineup should be, to who gets pinch-hit for, to when someone gets pulled for a defensive replacement and so on. And the person who will make these decisions is a manager whose worst tool is in-game management. Aaron Boone will be counted on to make countless logical, smart, intelligent moves throughout each game that will all need to have positive outcomes.

8. That’s what worries me most about the Yankees in this series: Boone’s brain. Boone will have his hands all over this series in a way he has never had to before. The front office did a good job Boone-proofing the pitching staff by giving him the best rotation and minimizing his in-game input on pitching decisions. Ideally, the formula would be starter to David Bednar, but when it’s not, he has two very good setup men and a pair of starters who would be No. 1 and No. 2 starters on a lot of major-league teams. But when it comes to the lineup, it won’t be so easy. Boone will have to balance going for offense while not sacrificing defense. He will have to use bench bats at the most opportune times and avoid his habit of creating lengthy left-handed lanes for the Red Sox to expose.

It’s unlikely the Yankees lose the Wild Card Series because their starting pitching gets lit up. It’s unlikely they lose because their bullpen implodes. It’s possible they lose because they don’t hit enough — a staple of the Boone era in the playoffs. But if they lose, it’s most likely because their manager fails to put his players in the best possible position to succeed. The Boone Yankees are 25-27 in the postseason. His Yankees have never won a series of 5 or 7 games against a non-AL Central team. A lot of it is because of the offense’s annual disappearing act, but Boone hasn’t done anything to elevate the chances of his previous seven postseason teams. If anything, he has hindered their chances of winning.

9. I like to say the Yankees need to outhit their own manager to win games to prevent him from having an impact on close games. That’s not possible in the playoffs, where games are low-scoring and close. Every decision Boone makes from the moment he starts to fill out his lineup card until the final out of each postseason game is crucial, and he has been incapable of handling the pressure that comes with making many consecutive correct decisions, which is what it takes to win in October. And now he will play his biggest role and have his biggest impact of his eight postseasons.

Even with Boone being asked to play the biggest role in the postseason of his managerial career, I believe the Yankees will win. Sure, if they had a healthy Judge and Stanton, it would make it a lot easier, but even without them, they are better than a Red Sox offense that makes the 2026 Yankees offense look like the 2009 Yankees. And for those who watched this offense every day for the last six months, you know how frustrating it is. The Red Sox haven’t scored more than four runs in a game since September 12.

10. I want nothing more than for the Yankees to win and for Boone to win. I don’t want to sit through another end-of-the-season press conference with him telling everyone how close the team is and how sweet it’s going to be once they do win it all. “The top of the mountain” as he likes to say. Just win for the first time in his nine-year tenure and the first time in 17 years for the franchise, so I can stop dreaming about the day he’s no longer employed by the team.

I’m nervous. How can you not be if you’re a Yankees fan? I expect the Yankees to win this series because I don’t want to envision this series ending any other way. At the end of today, the Yankees will either be playing for their season tomorrow or playing tomorrow for the chance to play on Saturday. It better be the latter because I can’t handle the former again.

1. The Yankees beat up a hungover and depleted Rays team (they sat four regulars) 9-2 on Wednesday, a day after the Rays clinched the AL East title at Yankee Stadium. No performance should be taken seriously from the game as both teams treated it like spring training.

2. That means don’t read into Gerrit Cole’s start (5.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 8 K) as he’s always better when there’s no pressure and the games don’t matter. Just look at his 2023 Cy Young season. It’s the one season the Yankees missed the playoffs during his tenure with them, and considering they were essentially eliminated at the All-Star break, he pitched more than two months of meaningless games to eventually win the award. Carlos Rodon (who is more deserving of a postseason start than Cole) faced the actual Rays — the version of the team still trying to win the division — on Tuesday and he pitched eight scoreless, three-hit innings without allowing a walk. Rodon saw the lineup the Rays will use in the postseason. Cole saw a lineup they will use in February and March.

3. It also means don’t read into the 2-for-4, five-RBI night from Ryan McMahon that included a grand slam. McMahon’s grand slam came against Mason Englert, who was called up from Triple-A to eat innings for a team locked into the AL’s No. 1 seed. McMahon hit his first home run since August 3 and his second since July 11 off a Triple-A pitcher because McMahon is a Triple-A player. Englert allowed 10 baserunners, eight earned runs and four home runs in 3 2/3 innings. I don’t think the Yankees are foolish enough to buy into some kind of McMahon resurgence over these last few exhibition-like games, but then again, there’s nothing the Yankees like more than playing an undeserving veteran they owe money to.

4. In the first of five exhibition games to finish the season, the Yankees didn’t really try anything new out. The only glaring change to the lineup was George Lombard Jr. batting second (he homered for the third time in six games) with Cody Bellinger getting the night off. Move Jose Caballero around. Give Anthony Volpe a start at third base. Do things that could give you flexibility next week. With the weather forecast looking bleak for the weekend series against the Orioles, there’s a good chance two of the games don’t get played since the Orioles’ elimination number is down to 1 and the Yankees can’t move in the standings. The Yankees may not have as many games remaining as they think to try out different defensive alignments.

5. The postseason is five days away and the Yankees’ roster has so many question marks. As of now, the only two sure things are Bellinger in left field and Lombard Jr. at shortstop. Every other position is an unknown. It got a lot more complicated on Wednesday when it was announced that Giancarlo Stanton was hitting, a day after he was shown running. Trent Grisham is also hitting. Jazz Chisholm just returned. And then there’s the bizarre situation with Aaron Judge where he says he “intends” to play and Aaron Boone says he isn’t playing. No one outside of the Yankees knows the degree of calf strain he has since all we have been told is that it’s “moderate.”

6. Is Austin Wells starting no matter what hand the pitcher throws with? Who plays first base: Luis Garcia or Paul Goldschmidt? Does Ben Rice play first if either Judge or Stanton comes back to DH? Is Chisholm definitely the second baseman or does he get benched like he did last postseason against a lefty? Does Volpe start at second against lefties? Is it going to be McMahon at third or Caballero or Amed Rosario or Volpe (who has been taking grounders at third and could play there in the remaining four games)? Is Spencer Jones undoubtedly the starting center fielder? What if Grisham is ready? Could Caballero start in center like he did this past week? Who’s in right field if Judge remains out and isn’t a defensive option? It’s preposterous that it’s Thursday and the Yankees will play the Red Sox on Tuesday and seven of nine lineup spots aren’t set, but that’s where we’re at.

7. It also seems like Cole is going to get the ball for Game 1. The problem with that is Cole is currently the Yankees’ No. 4 starter (and possibly No. 5 based on Will Warren’s recent run). If Cole had a different name, he wouldn’t be one of three Wild Card Series starters. The only time Cole has pitched like an ace for the Yankees in the postseason has been with no fans in the stands or against AL Central teams. The many variations of Red Sox rosters since 2020 have owned him. He has been getting lit up with home runs and gave up another on Wednesday to Cedric Mullins(!).

8. Cam Schlittler has owned the Red Sox in a way that no other Yankee has ever owned them. Really in a way that no other pitcher in history has. His numbers against them seem fake. At the moment, he’s the best starting pitcher in the American League, and at worst, the second-best starting pitcher in the world. How does he not get the ball against the team he owns to set the tone and potentially put the Yankees up 1-0 immediately in a best-of-3 series?

9. I understand that by pitching Schlittler in Game 2, he will have the opportunity to send the Yankees to the ALDS or to save their season, but it’s not like there’s an equal or close-to-equal option to start in his place in Game 1. Starting him in Game 2 is overthinking it and leaving Boone and the Yankees open for quite possibly the biggest real-time second-guess of the Boone era, which seems impossible given how many instances of poor decisions Boone has had in seven prior postseasons. If Cole starts Game 1 and the Yankees are in a hole before they even come to bat against Payton Tolle, it will be ugly.

10. Thursday will be Schlittler’s final start of the regular season. So either he will start Game 1 on normal rest or Game 2 with an extra day of rest. (Because the Yankees like to give their starting pitchers extra rest before the postseason, all signs point to him starting Game 2.) He already has the Cy Young Award in his pocket, so Thursday is about getting work in and staying healthy. Schlittler has thrown at least 92 pitches in all but two starts since June 7, so if the Yankees pull him earlier than that, it may be a hint that they are going to use him in Game 1 on normal rest. If he throws his normal high-90s or 100-plus pitches, we’ll know he’s going in Game 2. As long as Schlittler gets through Thursday night healthy, nothing else related to the game matters.

1. Another year, another team celebrating eliminating the Yankees at Yankee Stadium in some form. In 2022, the Astros won the American League pennant on the Yankee Stadium field. In 2024, the Dodgers won the World Series on the Yankee Stadium field. In 2025, the Blue Jays won the ALDS on the Yankee Stadium field. And on Tuesday, the Rays won the AL East on the Yankee Stadium field.

2. After losing the second game of Tuesday’s doubleheader, Aaron Boone was asked by Meredith Marakovits about losing the division to the Rays at Yankee Stadium and Boone was prepared with an answer since he answers the same question nearly every season.

“We wanted to push it off if we could,” Boone said. “They’ve put together a fantastic regular season to earn that.”

When the Rays bunted to squeeze in the second run in the division-clinching win, I couldn’t help but think about how many championships the Yankees would have if Kevin Cash had been their manager all these years. Two? Three? It’s certainly more than the zero they have won under Boone.

After the loss, the Yankees’ website put up the headline: ‘No East? No sweat: Yanks focused with Wild Card Series home-field clinched’ because not only are the manager and his team comfortable with losing, but so is the editorial side of the franchise.

3. “It kind of sucks,” Jazz Chisholm said. “That’s what we work on all season, but it’s not the end goal for us. The end goal is the World Series, so it doesn’t really affect us here.”

Actually, it does affect you. Because instead of having 10 days off between Wednesday and Saturday, Oct. 3 to rest anyone who needs it (like the Rays now have) and avoiding an entire postseason round, you have to play a best-of-3 beginning in six days against the Red Sox. And if you are fortunate enough to survive that round for a second straight season, you get to travel to Tampa to play at a venue where you rarely win and against a team you rarely beat. But yeah, it doesn’t affect you.

4. “You don’t want anyone to be celebrating at your stadium,” Max Fried said, even though all Fried has known as a Yankee is other teams celebrating at their stadium.

Fried wasn’t good, but it didn’t matter because the offense was worse. Drew Rasmussen no-hit the Yankees through six innings in what is likely a preview of what he’ll do to them in 10 days if they get a chance to play the Rays again. Cash let Rasmussen throw a career-high 114 pitches because he wanted to close out the division and not leave anything open to chance over the remaining five games. I can’t say the manager of the Yankees would have done the same thing if the roles were reversed and the Yankees were trying to clinch the No. 1 seed, a bye and home-field advantage throughout the AL playoffs.

But the roles weren’t reversed and the Yankees have now officially not won the division in six of nine seasons under Boone. It’s not nearly good enough for fans who expect more, though it’s clearly good enough for an organization that believes just getting to October is good enough, even if 40 percent of the league gets to October.

5. Why haven’t I mentioned the day game that the Yankees won? Because who cares? The entire offense was a two-run Cody Bellinger home run and Carlos Rodon was awesome again and will be rewarded by not getting to start a game in the Wild Card Series despite being more deserving of both Fried and Gerrit Cole. You could probably count on one hand the positive things I have written about Rodon in his four seasons as a Yankee (and you would likely have a couple of fingers left over), so for me to be advocating for him to start a postseason game despite a career of poor postseason performances, you know he’s deserving of it. (It will have to be Game 1 or 2 of the ALDS for Rodon, if the Yankees get there.)

6. Will they get there? Who knows. They are without their two biggest power threats, have a lefty-heavy lineup that is about to face nearly all left-handed pitchers from the Red Sox, have one starter you can truly count on, a bullpen that is running on fumes, the same old shitty defense and the same old shitty manager. The Red Sox aren’t any good (they went 32-46 then 32-5 then 20-22) and needed an all-time, six-week run to save their season, and I’m sure their fans don’t feel confident about a team that has been mediocre the last six weeks, but it’s the shortest of series and anything can happen. The Yankees lost three-game series this season to the Athletics, Angels, Reds, Tigers, Twins and Cardinals. At 8 p.m. on Tuesday both teams will be excited about the start of the postseason, and by the end of the night, one team will be on the brink of elimination.

The next five days represent meaningless games. The Yankees’ only goal between now and the end of the regular season is to not suffer another injury to anyone. Pull Bellinger and Ben Rice early from games since those two will represent the entirety of the Yankees’ offense next week, limit innings for starters and don’t let Brent Headrick, Paul Blackburn or David Bednar pitch more than once.

7. The Yankees will carry 14 position players and 12 pitchers for the Wild Card Series and these are likely the names at the moment:

1. Austin Wells
2. Ali Sanchez
3. Ben Rice
4. Luis Garcia
5. Paul Goldschmidt
6. Jazz Chisholm
7. George Lombard Jr.
8. Anthony Volpe
9. Jose Caballero
10. Cody Bellinger
11. Spencer Jones
12. Heliot Ramos
13. Amed Rosario
14. Ryan McMahon/Trent Grisham
15. Cam Schlittler
16. Gerrit Cole
17. Max Fried
18. Carlos Rodon
19. Will Warren
20. David Bednar
21. Brent Headrick
22. Paul Blackburn
23. John Schreiber
24. Tim Hill
25. Clarke Schmidt
26. Michael Fulmer/Ryan Weathers/Carlos Lagrange

I don’t care if Grisham doesn’t play before the postseason begins, I’m taking him over McMahon, who isn’t a major leaguer and should no longer be a Yankee. The $16 million owed to him next season is a sunk cost. Move on.

The bullpen is trickier. If Weathers is healthy, put him on the roster. If Lagrange gets a chance in the last five games and knows where the ball is going, put him on. The goal needs to be to get Fulmer out of the equation as a possibility because if he’s on the roster, Boone will use him. There’s nothing Boone loves more than using someone who has no business pitching in an enormous spot in said spot. He went to Lance Lynn with the 2018 ALDS on the line. He turned to J.A. Happ for the 10th inning in Game 2 of the 2019 ALCS. There’s the 2020 ALDS Game 2 debacle. His love of Albert Abreu in the final weekend of the 2021 season is why the wild-card game that year was played at Fenway Park. He used Schmidt instead of his closer in Game 3 of the 2022 ALDS (Schmidt got walked off on) and then had Schmidt be the first guy out of the bullpen in a 1-1 game in Game 1 of the 2022 ALCS (Schmidt allowed two home runs to the first three batters he faced). He went to Nestor Cortes, who hadn’t pitched in 37 days, with a WORLD SERIES GAME ON THE LINE. He pulled Fried after 6 1/3 scoreless innings with a 1-0 lead in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series last year for Luke Weaver, who had a 7.36 ERA over the final month of the season. Weaver faced three batters, allowed two runs and didn’t get an out. If you’re on the postseason roster as a pitcher, Boone will have you pitch, and you’re likely going to be put into a situation in which you are unlikely to succeed. That’s why Fulmer needs to be unseated.

8. The Yankees operate under the philosophy that if you continue to get into the postseason year after year, eventually everything will break right and you will win it all. It’s the same philosophy the Dodgers live by. Except the Dodgers won one fake World Series in the first 11 years of this current run. They needed to change managers, trade for Mookie Betts, sign Freddie Freeman and Shohei Ohtani and get Yoshinobu Yamamoto to agree to take less money to go to the West Coast over the East Coast to win a real one. They started winning when they stopped running it back. They started winning when they made changes.

The Yankees don’t believe in change. Not in the front office, not in the dugout and not on the field. They took a team that wasn’t good enough to win the division last year and ran it back, and shockingly, that team wasn’t good enough to win the division this year.

9. “Hopefully, we get another crack at them in the next couple of weeks,” Boone said of losing the division to the Rays.

The 2025 Yankees got beat up all season by the Blue Jays and then got beat up by them in the postseason. The 2026 Yankees are 4-7 against the Rays and it’s possible we’ll see if the same year-over-year roster is good enough to win a round in the actual postseason and not just the Wild Card Series.

But first, they’ll have to win the Wild Card Series. The 2025 Yankees were able to, but they also faced a Red Sox team that had Jarren Duran as its leadoff hitter, a team that gave two of three postseason starts to Brayan Bello and a rookie with a handful of career starts and a team that was without Roman Anthony and didn’t yet have Willson Contreras.

10. I will spend the next five or six days trying to make myself believe this season won’t end exactly like last year’s did (losing in the ALDS) or worse (losing to the Red Sox), and ultimately the same way the last 16 Yankees seasons have ended: without a championship.

1. The Yankees arrived in Arizona to play a struggling Diamondbacks team that had lost five of seven and couldn’t beat them. The Yankees lost two of three to the Diamondbacks, blowing leads in both losses. The Yankees won 9-2 on Friday, blew a 3-2 lead on Saturday to lose 5-3 and blew a 4-1 lead on Sunday to lose 8-4. The Yankees were unable to add on to either of their leads on Saturday, when they allowed three unanswered runs, or on Sunday, when they allowed seven unanswered runs.

2. A couple of weeks ago, the Yankees arrived in Anaheim with the Angels having lost seven straight, and the Angels promptly beat the Yankees 10-1. Then the Yankees went to San Diego to play a Padres team that had lost seven of nine, and the Yankees lost two of three to the Padres. This is what the Yankees do. The Red Sox were 32-46 before sweeping the Yankees in a four-game series to jumpstart their season at the end of June.

3. It’s a good thing the Yankees had a load management plan in place for Aaron Judge’s return two weeks ago to prevent him from getting injured. The Yankees continue to have these ridiculous rest plans for players and pitchers who recently returned to prevent injury and they never work. Never. This season is didn’t work for Judge. Nothing works for Giancarlo Stanton. Max Fried came back from a bone bruise, was limited by a pitch count and went back on the injured list with a bone bruise. Carlos Rodon missed a chunk of the season, came back, was limited and went back on the IL. Trent Grisham has been on the IL twice with hamstring injuries. Clarke Schmidt couldn’t pitch over the weekend because of biceps soreness. There’s no way to prevent injury other than to not play (unless you’re Stanton, who somehow always injures an additional body part while on the IL for a different body part).

4. And now Judge won’t play until at least the last game of the season. Judge made Ryan McMahon look like the MVP version of Aaron Judge during his return, going 4-for-23 with 13 strikeouts. So he’s going to come back either in Game 162 and get one game’s worth of at-bats, or just come back for the postseason with no at-bats? No one should count on Judge to return and no one should count on him being anything more than a name in the lineup if he returns.

5. To add to the oft-injured softness that is the New York Yankees, Spencer Jones sat out Saturday’s game with “wear-and-tear” from playing on turf. He played on turf on Friday and previously played on it in Toronto on August 16. So two turf games in 35 days were too much for the 25-year-old to handle. Jones overcame his toe issue to play on Sunday and hit a home run. Good thing he didn’t play Saturday. I’m sure the Yankees couldn’t have used his bat in a two-run loss.

6. The Yankees wasted another really good Cam Schlittler start on Saturday as the righty allowed one earned run in six innings. Schlittler could pitch seven scoreless innings in the postseason or allow one or two runs and the Yankees could lose. It’s my biggest fear. What if Schlittler is spectacular and the offense can’t do anything, like it frequently can’t? Then I guess the postseason won’t last more than a few days.

7. Tuesday was supposed to be an awesome day with the Yankees trying to surpass the Rays and two games at Yankee Stadium to begin a four-game series. Instead, the games are meaningless. The Yankees are six games back with seven games to play. The Yankees have to sweep the Rays and then sweep the Orioles next weekend, while the the Rays win no more than one game against the Phillies. It’s not happening.

8. What is happening is the Rays celebrating a division title on the Yankee Stadium field at some point this week. It could happen Tuesday afternoon or Tuesday night or Wednesday or Thursday, but it’s happening. Add another line to the list of embarrassing moments that have happened under Aaron Boone’s watch.

9. Boone called the 2025 Yankees the best roster he has managed and that team was humiliated in four games in the ALDS. He called the 2026 Yankees the deepest team he has managed and the team couldn’t win the division for the sixth time in Boone’s nine seasons. The “best” team couldn’t get out of the real first round and the “deepest” team couldn’t overcome injuries to beat out a team whose highest-paid player makes $2 million less than DJ LeMahieu this season (and LeMahieu hasn’t been a Yankee in 14 months).

10. This week and the remaining seven games may as well be extended spring training. The division is over and the Yankees are going to be the first wild card. The next meaningful game will be next Tuesday night against the Red Sox in the first game of the Wild Card Series. Until then, the results don’t matter, only staying healthy does. And with this roster, staying healthy for a week is less likely than overcoming a six-game division deficit with seven to play.

1. The Yankees will play the Red Sox in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series on Tuesday, Sept. 29 at Yankee Stadium. That was made certain on Wednesday when the Yankees lost the series finale to the Twins. Now five games back in the loss column of the Rays, the Yankees would need to sweep the Diamondbacks this weekend in Arizona and have the Rays lose three of four to the A’s and Red Sox over the next four days to be where I thought they needed to be going into next week’s four-game series: two games back. But I don’t know what’s less likely: the Yankees sweeping a team with something to play for when they couldn’t even beat the Twins on Wednesday or the Rays losing three of four when all they have done is win, win and win some more to hold off the Yankees.

2. The Yankees are going to fall short of winning the division for the second straight season and for the sixth time in nine seasons under Aaron Boone. At a time when most of the league is actively not trying (there are five teams in the AL with a positive run differential) and when it’s never been easier to reach the playoffs with 40 percent of the league getting in (it’s possible one or more AL playoff teams finish under .500), the Yankees have done nothing to separate themselves from the rest of the AL. Instead, they will need to win a best-of-3 series (against the one team they needed to avoid) to reach the real postseason.

We are living last season all over again. The Yankees got off to a fast start, built up a lead in the division, squandered that lead after taking the summer months of the season off and then tried to make it all back in the final weeks of the season. Like last season, their end-of-the-season cramming strategy will fall short. While the Blue Jays allowed the division to go down to the final day with spotty play in September, the Rays have kept their foot on the gas. When the Yankees got the deficit down to 1 1/2 games in the final week of July, the Rays went 12-2 to push it back up to 6 1/2. When the Yankees cut it back down to three games in the last week of August, the Rays answered by going 7-2 to increase it again. And when the Yankees got it back down to three last Thursday, the Rays began the five-game winning streak they’re currently on. The Yankees have gone 34-20 since July 19, but the Rays have gone 36-17. The Yankees have gone 20-9 since August 16, but the Rays have gone 18-11. The Yankees have gone 10-4 in September, but the Rays have also gone 10-4. Each time the door has appeared to be open for the Yankees to overtake the Rays, the Rays immediately closed it.

3. The Rays’ payroll is going to be around $114 million for the season, or the rough equivalent of what the Yankees are paying Carlos Rodon (will finish with a half-season of starts), Trent Grisham (.703 OPS and two injured-list stays), Giancarlo Stanton (24 games played), Ryan McMahon (28 percent worse than league average), DJ LeMahieu (was released on July 10 last season) and Jazz Chisholm (.715 OPS). The Rays’ highest-paid player (Nick Martinez) will earn $13 million in 2026, which is $3 million less than McMahon and $2 million less than LeMahieu.

4. So now the Yankees will try to survive a three-game series against the Red Sox for a second straight season. Except this time the Red Sox won’t be starting Brayan Bello in a postseason series or a rookie taking a major-league mound in a winner-take-all game with just a handful of starts to his name. This time they will have Roman Anthony in the lineup and they will have Sonny Gray (2.76 ERA this season and 3.23 career postseason ERA), Payton Tolle (one earned run and four hits allowed in 13 innings against the Yankees) and Ranger Suarez (who owns one of the best postseason starter ERAs of all time). And if the Yankees do survive the Wild Card Series, they will travel to Tampa (to play at a venue they never win in) to play the Rays (a team they are 3-6 against this season) on just one or two days rest with their rotation out of order, while the Rays will have had a week off. It’s the same awful setup the Yankees had last October, a setup they deserved then and deserve now for taking the summers off as if they are educators.

5. If the Yankees had won the division and were able to host the first two games of a best-of-5 against a Rays or Red Sox team with its rotations out of order, I would have loved their chances of reaching the World Series. Because whichever of the three AL East teams survives the AL East-only bracket is going to the World Series. The Astros, Rangers, Guardians and White Sox are all jokes. But needing to best the Red Sox again and then needing to get past a well-rested Rays team with everything set up to favor them is a lot to ask. It’s doable, it’s just not favorable, which is what happens when you’re a wild-card berth.

It doesn’t matter that the Yankees have the best run differential and best team on paper. The postseason isn’t played in a vacuum, and the Yankees’ path to the World Series is now set up like the least desirable mirror maze imaginable. Beat the Red Sox and then beat the Rays with everything stacked to the Rays’ advantage (because they earned it) from rest to rotation to venue to home-field advantage? Again, it’s a lot to ask.

6. It will be a near-impossible ask if Aaron Judge is out again with a different injury. Judge left Wednesday’s game after striking out in two at-bats and coming as close to hitting a fastball as any fan picked at random would. Judge is 4-for-23 with 13 strikeouts and one walk since returning and looks more like Aaron Hicks before being designated for assignment than Aaron Judge. It says a lot about the Yankees’ roster construction that everyone employed by the Yankees and every fan of the Yankees knows the team’s postseason chances rest on the health of a guy who missed more than half of the season and who looks like he’s blindfolded at the plate right now.

7. The division-losing loss came in the form of a road extra-inning loss, in which the Yankees led in the 10th and 11th innings, had the bases loaded with no outs and didn’t score a run in the 12th inning and then didn’t score the automatic runner against in the 13th. How can you not be romantic about baseball? The worst road extra-inning team since the automatic runner was implemented in 2020 blowing their last chance at a bye by losing such a game was like a fairy-tale story with a horrible, yet predictable ending.

8. It’s hard to win a division when you can’t beat Zebby Matthews and the Twins. The Yankees’ offense performed like a team that is content with being the first wild card. The offense was pathetic against Matthews — the kind of starter that has shut them down too many times this season, and the kind of starter they won’t see in October. There won’t be a Zebby Matthews in the postseason. There will be Gray, Tolle, Suarez and Drew Rasmussen and Shane McClanahan and so on. The Yankees’ offense is too inconsistent to make any Yankees fan feel good about October or to make any Yankees fan believe this October will be different than all of the other Octobers under this manager.

With or without a healthy, otherworldly Judge, the Yankees’ lineup has too many holes. George Lombard Jr. should be a rookie worried about playing great defense and batting ninth as he learns how to hit at this level. He shouldn’t be batting sixth for a team that thinks it can win a championship. Instead of being hidden at the bottom of the lineup under the notion that anything he gives you offensively is a bonus, Lombard Jr. is being forced into a middle-of-the-order role. He has a middle-of-the-order role because the options behind him like McMahon, Austin Wells and Anthony Volpe are all inferior to a 21-year-old with 34 career games and a .627 OPS.

McMahon isn’t a major-league player. How could he be with a .621 OPS and 72 OPS+ and an arm that can’t reach first base in the air. He does nothing well, and yet, he’s under contract for $16 million in 2027. The “Let’s See If He Can Find It” strategy didn’t work for Josh Donaldson (a former MVP who finished his career with a 129 OPS+) in 2022 or 2023, and it shouldn’t be an option for McMahon in 2027. McMahon shouldn’t be playing now, let alone next season. He shouldn’t even receive a postseason roster spot. He’s an awful baseball player with poor body language. His offensive effort on Wednesday was despicable.

9. Heliot Ramos against right-handed pitching is a disgrace and Luis Garcia against left-handed pitching is an equal disgrace. If Ben Rice and Cody Bellinger and Judge (when he’s himself) don’t put the Yankees on the board, the Yankees don’t get on the board with any consistency. Sure, Garcia (against righties) and Spencer Jones have their moments, but nothing that can be counted on. It’s hard to win when there is no expectation that nearly two-thirds of the lineup will do anything other than strike out, pop up or ground out. And that’s against the entire league and back-end starters barely in the league. What will happen when the field is cut down to only the best in 12 days and the No. 4 and No. 5 starters and middle relievers don’t see the mound? I think we know what will happen since we have seen it happen in every postseason in the Boone era.

10. It’s off to Arizona for the last road series of the season where the Yankees will try to sweep the Diamondbacks and simultaneously pray the Athletics and Red Sox can win three of four against the Rays to keep their 5.6 percent chance to win the division alive. The Yankees no longer control their own destiny. It’s no longer right in front of them, though since the end of June it likely never was. Ten games remain before a best-of-3 series I desperately wanted them to avoid. There’s no avoiding it now: Yankees-Red Sox in a couple of Tuesdays in the Bronx.