1. This time it was the sixth inning.

Seven months after the fifth-inning meltdown, which ended the Yankees’ bid to end the franchise’s 15-year championship drought, the Yankees did their best to recapture the disappointment of that night on Friday at Dodger Stadium.

This time it was the new ace.

Paying homage to Gerrit Cole’s unraveling in Game 5 of the World Series, Max Fried — the best pitcher in the league this season — fell apart in the sixth. Cole was on the mound when the five-run lead turned into a tie game last fall and Fried was on the mound on Friday as a three-run lead turned into a one-run deficit. Fried couldn’t get an out in the sixth, allowing a home run, two singles and a double before he was relieved. The six earned runs charged to Fried were the most given up by any Yankees starter this season, a season in which Will Warren had a 5.65 ERA through early May and Carlos Carrasco was allowed to make six starts.

“The guys did a great job tonight, putting up early runs,” Fried said. “I just didn’t do my job.”

Fried and the relievers who followed (Jonathan Loaisiga, Tim Hill and Yerry De los Santos) weren’t any good in turning a 5-1 lead into an 8-5 loss (the vision of Freeman doing the Dodgers dance on second base haunts my life), but they were let down by their defense the same way Cole was last fall.

2. It was a rough night for Anthony Volpe and his supporters. Those supporters consist of fans who will defend Volpe to no end against criticism, citing his exceptional defense as the reason to disregard his inconsistent offense. It seems when a game and moment are at their biggest, Volpe is at his worst in the field. A disastrous trait for the most important position within the infield. Volpe couldn’t come up with two ground balls in the sixth that would have snuffed the dodgers rally. Two balls that a “Gold Glove” defender has to come up with. Two balls that someone who provides nothing for long stretches with the bat needs to come up with.

3. Defensively, Volpe served as fuel for the Dodgers sixth-inning fire. Offensively, he served as an extinguisher for the Yankees’ rallies. With one run in and two on in the first and a chance to break the game open the game before the Dodgers could bat for the first time, Volpe hit a fly ball with a .010 expected batting average.

When he came up in the third after Paul Goldschmidt hit a leadoff home run to give the Yankees a 5-2 lead and Ben Rice had ripped a 110-mph single to right, Volpe hit into a a double play. Eight of 14 Yankees had come to the plate and reached base before Volpe’s double play and the two batters after him also reached. Four Yankees reached in the inning, but sandwiched around Volpe’s costly double play, the Yankees weren’t able to score. An 0-for-4 night with five outs made, a strikeout, three weakly hit balls, three left on and two have-to-have plays not made in the field. A golden night for the Golden Boy.

4. There is this perception that Volpe has been better in 2025 than he was in 2024. Sure, if you take the last third of 2024 and compare it to the first third of 2025, Volpe has been better. But here is Volpe through the first third of 2024 compared to the first third of 2025:

Home runs
2024: 6
2025: 6

RBIs
2024: 23
2025: 33

Walks
2024: 22
2025: 23

Strikeouts
2024: 52
2025: 59

Doubles
2024: 9
2025: 12

Stolen Bases/Attempts
2024: 11 of 14 (78.6%)
2025: 7 of 11 (63.6%)

Runs
2024: 36
2025: 27

Batting Average
2024: .285
2025: .241

On-Base Percentage
2024: .356
2025: .319

Slugging Percentage
2024: .434
2025: .433

OPS
2024: .791
2025: .752

(He has more RBIs this year because he’s always hitting fifth or sixth, and he had more runs last season because he hit at the bottom of the lineup ahead of Juan Soto and Aaron Judge.)

For all the talk about how good Volpe has been this season by many, he was much better at this time last year and still managed to finish 16 percent worse than league average for the year. If Volpe were to maintain the .752 OPS he has now for all of 2025 and stay on pace with the other numbers, yes, this season would be a success for him and a sign he has taken the next step in his development. But we’re a long way from that and all signs through two months point to him being an exceedingly streaky hitter.

5. Five runs should be more than enough to win a game started by Fried, but it wasn’t. Like the Game 5 collapse, the Yankees scored five runs in the first three innings on Saturday, however, in Game 5 they managed to score a sixth run over the final six innings. On Friday, the Yankees packed it in after the third and didn’t score again despite facing Tony Gonsolin for three more innings and the Dodgers’ bullpen for the last three.

6. Unlike the World Series, Judge actually showed up for this one, homering in his first at-bat and doubling in the seventh to put the potential tying run in scoring position before being stranded because the Dodgers’ relievers actually did their jobs. And unlike the World Series when Judge dropped a fly ball hit right at him that will forever be the lasting image of the the collapse, he made a nice diving catch early in the game, completely laying out for the ball in right field.

7. The Yankees continue to play daily with two automatic outs in the lineup with at least two of DJ LeMahieu, Oswald Peraza and Jorbit Vivas playing every game. That will change this coming week when Jazz Chisholm returns, but it still means one of those three will play every day. That trio combined for an 0-for-5 game with a walk and hit by pitch in the series opener. One of the zeros was from LeMahieu who pinch hit for Peraza in the eighth representing the tying run and hit a fly ball with an expected batting average of .030 to end the threat. With each passing day and each unproductive at-bat, LeMahieu sadly inches a little closer to no longer being a Yankee, and with only recording a hit in one game (he had three in the blowout last week at Coors Field) in the last nearly two weeks, that day will be coming soon if he doesn’t turn it around immediately.

8. I could pick apart Aaron Boone’s bullpen management, which helped the Dodgers come back, but I will give the manager the day off, considering Hill walked in the go-ahead run in the sixth (even if removing Loaisiga and/or loading the bases purposely before brining in Hill was foolish and letting the last man in the bullpen face the 2-3-4 hitters of the Dodgers in a one-run game was irresponsible). Loaisiga needs to be better. Hill needs to be better. Yerry De los Santos … well, it’s not his fault as the last or second-to-last arm in the bullpen the “lane” given to him in a one-run game was Teoscar Hernandez, Will Smith and Freddie Freeman. Luke Weaver, Devin Williams and Mark Leiter Jr. are all more than rested going into Saturday and I expect to see them if. the game is close.

9. Hopefully, the game isn’t close. Hopefully, the offense beats the crap out of Landon Knack, stakes Warren to a multi-run lead and it’s smooth sailing for the night. The Yankees could use a game like that. Their most recent games were last night’s meltdown, a 1-0 win, a 3-2 win, a 5-1 win that was a nail-biter in the ninth, a 5-4 win that was a nail-biter in the ninth, a 13-1 blowout win, a 3-2 loss, a 1-0 win, a 4-3 win and. a 5-2 win. Of. theYankees’ last 10 games, only last Saturday’s rout of the Rockies wasn’t close.

10. The good version of Warren needs to show up on Saturday. The version that shut down. the A’s and Mariners, stifled the Rangers and handled the Rockies after a shaky first inning. If early-season Warren or first-inning in Colorado Warren shows up against the Dodgers, things could get ugly. Warren can’t nibble and be afraid to throw strikes like he has the penchant to do at times against the Dodgers. Even without Mookie Betts, the Dodgers won’t allow Warren to settle in and figure it out if he doesn’t have it from the get-go. That’s why the offense (especially the top of the order since all that can be trusted) needs to go out and have the kind of start they had on Friday on Saturday and support him early.

1. If you had told me the Yankees would have two doubles, three singles and three walks in the first two innings against the Angels on Wednesday, I would have figured they put up a big, crooked number and sent everyone on the East Coast to bed early and happy. The Yankees did put eight runners on base in the first two innings against the Angels on Wednesday, but only one of them scored.

2. The Yankees put another runner on in the third, but then instead of leaving everyone on base, they just stopped putting anyone on base. Starting with one out in the third, Yusei Kikuchi retired eight straight to end his day, having allowed just the one run through five despite putting nine on and needing 93 pitches to get 15 outs. (It wasn’t as if one run allowed over five innings from Kikuchi against the Yankees was surprising as the lefty pitched well against them over the last three years with the Blue Jays.)

3. The Yankees’ lack of offense didn’t end with Kikuchi leaving the game. Thirteen straight Yankees were retired from one out in the third until two outs in the seventh and 22 of 26 were retired from the last out of the second through the end of the game. The Yankees struck out 13 times.

4. While the Yankees offense didn’t do anything, neither did the Angels thanks to the best start of the season from Clarke Schmidt: 6 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 4 K. Similar to Kikuchi, Schmidt put two on in the first, two on in the second and one on in the fourth, but escaped each jam without damage.

With Luke Weaver, Devin Williams and Jonathan Loaisiga all unavailable, I was hoping for a big night from the offense to mitigate whatever crazy bullpen plan Aaron Boone would use to navigate the game after Schmidt. The plan ended up being Ian Hamilton for five outs, Tim Hill for one and Mark Leiter Jr. for three and the trio made the lone run from the first inning stand up in the 1-0 win.

5. In the last 20 games Yankees started have averaged nearly six innings per start with 138 strikeouts, 29 walks and a 2.25 ERA. Yankees pitching held the Angels to three runs in the series.

“We have guys with great stuff and guys who throw strikes and execute,” Schmidt said. “It’s a credit to this pitching staff.

The Yankees have won seven straight series and 16 of their last 20 games. The only loss standing between them and a 10-game winning streak is a one-run loss to the Rockies, the team that will go down as the worst in baseball history. I guess that’s baseball, Suzyn.

6. All I wanted from DJ LeMahieu was for him to be league average at the plate, but I knew even that was asking for a lot from a guy who was five percent worse than league average from 2021 through 2024. After a few good at-bats in his first couple of games back this season, LeMahieu looks every bit as bad as he did last year in 67 games. He had another 0-for-4 on Wednesday and it wasn’t an 0-for-4 with productive outs or bad luck, it was four bad at-bats. In his first at-bat, he ended the first inning by swinging at the first pitch he saw with the bases loaded, hitting a weak fly ball to center with an expected batting average of .150. He grounded out on a ball with an expected batting average of .080 in his second at0bat and struck out in both his third and fourth at-bats against hard-throwing relievers. LeMahieu is 3-for-his-last-26 and all three hits came in Saturday’s blowout at Coors Field. LeMahieu is hitless in the other seven games he has played since the second game of the Subway Series.

LeMahieu is going to continue to get to play second because it looks like the Yankees are going to have Jazz Chisholm play third when he returns. Chisholm could be back as early as next week, which will lengthen the lineup and remove one of the Yankees’ two weakest bats from the lineup.

7. Like LeMahieu, Aaron Judge also took a fastball down the middle to strike out looking in his final at-bat of the game. In that at-bat, Trent Grisham was on first and took off for second once Judge had two strikes. It was a smart move by Boone to have Grisham run because he would have either been safe and Judge would either hit with a runner in scoring or be walked, or Grisham would be thrown out and Judge would get to lead off the right with a fresh count.

Judge didn’t get to see a pitch until the fifth inning in his third plate appearance as he was intentionally walked in both the first and second innings. It was the first time a Yankee had been intentionally walked in the first since 2012.

“I didn’t really like the intentional walk there, but it’s the manager’s decision, so we’ll just go with it,” Kikuchi said.

Judge was intentionally walked again in the second inning to become the first Yankee to be intentionally walked twice in the first two innings since 1953. (Stats from Katie Sharp.)

“I don’t know what would’ve happened in that game if I wouldn’t have walked him those first two times,” Ron Washington said. “You don’t mess with that. I don’t care how he’s swinging the bat. You don’t mess with that if you don’t have to.”

8. Grisham went 2-for-5 with a double and three strikeouts. Grisham has been immune to the lineup rotation, having started the last 17 games dating back to May 8 in Sacramento. He’s started 27 of the last 28 games and continues to bat first or second in the lineup. When he bats second, Judge bats third as was the case on Wednesday, and once again Judge didn’t bat in the ninth inning because of it. Again, Judge should be batting second no matter what hand the opposing starter throws with and no matter who is in the lineup.  Unfortunately it seems like he’s going to continue to hit third as Boone has been putting Goldschmidt and a lefty ahead of him when a lefty starts and Grisham and Ben Rice ahead of him when a righty starts.

9. Rice was the odd man out of the lineup against the lefty, a night after hitting a home run off a better lefty. It’s too bad the Yankees can’t have two designated hitters. One in the actual DH spot and one that gets to hit for either LeMahieu or Oswald Peraza, while still get to play the field. Rice did pinch hit for Peraza to lead off the seventh on Wednesday and smoked a first-pitch line drive, it just happened to go right at Luis Rengifo at second base for an out. A one-pitch night for Rice and back to the bench until Friday.

10. On Friday, the Yankees will be back at Dodger Stadium where they lost Games 1 and 2 of the World Series. With all three games on national platforms this weekend, get ready for a heavy dose of replays of Freddie Freeman’s walk-off grand slam and the fifth inning meltdown.

“It’s going to be great to see how we stack up against them,” Judge said. “I think the boys in here are all excited and ready to go.”

Max Fried gets the ball on Friday and what better way to show the Dodgers this Yankees team is much different than last year’s than sending the best pitcher in baseball to the mound to begin the series.

1. For the last two seasons I have written a lot of words about Carlos Rodon, nearly all of which have been critical. Those words have been deserved. I don’t need to recite all of Rodon’s shortcomings since signing his six-year deal for which he makes roughly $800,000 per start, but every word I wrote about his lackluster first two seasons with the Yankees was earned.

2. For as bad as Rodon was in his first season and inconsistent in his second with the Yankees, he’s been that good and that consistent this year. Sure, the season is only one-third of the way through and at he could revert to his clean-shaven self, though I don’t see it. It doesn’t mean that I trust Rodon (or will ever, especially in the postseason), it’s that this version of Rodon is different, mainly because he stopped being a two-pitch pitcher.

3. “I just have a good understanding of what I want to do out there,” Rodon said. (Where was that understanding the last two years? I don’t know.)

Rodon has made 11 starts for the Yankees this season and has allowed just 42 hits in 72 2/3 innings. He’s averaging six innings per start and looks like the 2021-2022 version of himself that the Yankees were so eager to give $162 million to.

4. Rodon’s seven shutout innings on Tuesday in Anaheim were nearly for nothing. With a 3-0 lead in the eighth, Jonathan Loaisiga relieved Rodon and pitched a 1-2-3 eighth, but with Luke Weaver down after a recent heavy workload, Devin Williams served as the fill-in closer for the ninth and was every bit as shaky as he was when he was the closer.

Williams gave up a leadoff home run to Yoan Moncada to make it 3-1 and Taylor Ward followed with a single. Williams got Travis d’Arnaud to fly out to center on a ball hit 105 mph with an expected batting average of .900 before Luis Rengifo singled to center, setting up first and third with one out. Jo Adell grounded out to make it 3-2 with the tying run was still on base at first. Williams fell behind Logan O’Hoppe 3-0 and O’Hoppe swung at the 3-0 pitch and popped it up to third in foul territory to end the game.

“At the end of the day, we won,” Williams said, “and that’s all that matters.”

Yes, that’s true, but the inning did nothing to dispel the fear Williams is still broken.

5. The Yankees built their three-run lead with a Ben Rice solo home run in the fourth, an Anthony Volpe RBI single in the sixth and an Oswald Peraza solo homer in the seventh. Runs were going to be tough to come by against a left-handed starter (despite Michael Kay telling everyone still awake and watching how good the Yankees have been against left-handed pitching), especially a lefty like Tyler Anderson. The Yankees only had six hits in the game, but three of them were for extra bases and they drew five walks and caught a massive break when Matthew Lugo misplayed a ball in center.

6. Kay continues to ask the question of what’s going to happen with Rice once Giancarlo Stanton returns, and as of now, there’s no answer. Rice’s bat is worthy of playing every day, but without a position other than first base, it will be even harder than it has been to play him every day. The Yankees’ lineup conundrum continues to be that their best bats all play the same position or have no position and their worst bats are the only options at second base and third base. If Rice were a third baseman, there wouldn’t be a problem. Unfortunately, he’s not. Until Stanton is off of the injured list and available to play in a game, it’s not an issue. And given Stanton’s lengthy injury history and inability to recover without setbacks, it’s a problem not worth worrying about until he’s activated.

7. Jasson Dominguez got the night off against the lefty, but the Yankees are going to face another lefty on Wednesday in Yusei Kikuchi, who always had their numbers as a Blue Jay. Dominguez will be back in the lineup, and I think Trent Grisham will sit since Bellinger has destroyed lefties this season and just had a day off in Colorado.

8. Is this the lineup on Wednesday?

Paul Goldschmidt, 1B
Ben Rice, DH
Aaron Judge, RF
Cody Bellinger, CF
Anthony Volpe, SS
Jasson Dominguez, LF
DJ LeMahieu, 2B
Austin Wells, C
Oswald Peraza, 3B

9. Weaver pitched on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Sunday and Monday, so I think he will be unavailable again on Wednesday (and he should be). Williams may be down also (though no one is sad about that) after throwing 19 pitches on Tuesday. So the “A” arms available will likely be Loaisiga and Mark Leiter Jr. That means there will be some outs in the middle innings needed from Tim Hill, Yerry De los Santos, Brent Headrick and Ian Hamilton. And there will be outs needed in the middle innings because Clarke Schmidt is starting.

10. It would be great if Schmidt could go seven (like Rodon did) and hand the ball off to Leiter Jr. and Loaisiga the way, but Schmidt has just to get an out in the seventh inning this season. I’ll sign up for five strong innings from Schmidt, a big day from the offense and a sweep of the Angels before Thursday’s day off and the Dodgers this weekend.

1. Memorial Day is the unofficial first checkpoint to evaluate the baseball season when the season is roughly one-third of the way through. The Yankees are in first place at the first checkpoint. They have a six-game lead in the loss column in the AL East, have scored the most runs in the AL with 301 (2o more than the next team), have allowed the third fewest and have the best run differential at plus-111 (30 runs more than the next team). When the Yankees left spring training, their win total was set at 88.5 (which yours truly jumped all over), and as of now, the Yankees are on pace for 101 wins. (They have to go 56-53 the rest of the way to hit the over on 88.5 wins.)

2. Overall, the Yankees have had a very successful first third of the season, especially when you consider Carlos Carrasco was allowed to start six games; Will Warren didn’t figure out how to pitch until his eighth start; they lost their starting second baseman before the end of April; have used four different third basemen; won’t receive a start this year from their former ace; haven’t received a start yet from last season’s Rookie of the Year; their closer to start the season couldn’t get anyone out for a month and Cody Bellinger didn’t start hitting until the first week of May. Even with all of the injuries and underperformance, the Yankees have the largest division lead in the majors, have a 90 percent chance to reach the postseason, a 76 percent chance to receive bye to the ALDS and the highest odds in the AL to win the World Series at 15 percent.

3. All of that is possible because Max Fried has been the best pitcher in baseball, Carlos Rodon is having his best season as a Yankee; something has finally clicked for Warren; Ryan Yarbrough has been a Swiss Army Knife; the bullpen has been mostly solid led by Luke Weaver; Aaron Judge is again having one of the single-greatest seasons in history; Trent Grisham and Ben Rice hit like two Juan Sotos for a month; Paul Goldschmidt looks like his 2022 NL MVP self; Bellinger has a 1.024 OPS in May and Jasson Dominguez, Anthony Volpe and Austin Wells have come through with timely hits along the way.

4. Even with all of their early-season success, the Yankees have their flaws, they just have less than the rest of the AL other than the Tigers to date. Aaron Boone will always be a flaw, the bullpen is shaky with its lack of overall velocity, the rotation has used up all of its depth and the two-thirds of the lineup is extremely inconsistent. We saw the inconsistencies of the lineup over the weekend in Colorado and on Monday in Anaheim.

So far on this West Coast trip, the Yankees are 3-1, but outside of their Saturday rout of the Rockies, the lineup has done it’s no-idea-what-to-expect-from-one-game-to-another act. The Yankees mustered just two runs in nine innings against Rockies pitching in elevation on Friday in an embarrassing loss, barely held on to win the rubber game against the worst-team-ever Rockies on Sunday and had one big inning against the Angels and close to nothing else on Monday.

5. After avoiding becoming the first team to lose a series to the Rockies this season, the Yankees arrived in Anaheim to play another bad Angels team. Despite the Angels mediocre-at-best play in recent years, the Yankees haven’t had much success against them, going 3-3 against them last year and 2-4 against them the year before. The Yankees tend to play to the level of their competition, which how you get series like this past weekend against the Rockies, and how the Yankees have managed to lose series to the Rays and Orioles and needed a comeback win to win a series against the Pirates earlier this year. When the Yankees play the Angels, they tend to play like the Angels.

6. That held true for the first three innings on Monday. Facing Jack Kochanowicz and his major-league-worst 1.30 strikeout-to-walk ratio, the Yankees made it easy for him early. They went down on 10 pitches in the first, 11 pitches in the second and seven pitches in the third. Kochanowicz went nine up, nine down to start the game, needing only 28 pitches to get through the Yankees once with two strikeouts and no walks. It was beginning to feel like the Yankees maybe enjoyed their first night Southern California after arriving from Denver on Sunday a little too much. But in the fourth, the good version of the Yankees offense showed up.

7. Trailing 1-0 from the Zach Neto leadoff home run off of Yarbrough, Rice, Grisham and Judge hit back-to-back-to-back singles to begin the fourth. Bellinger drew a four-pitch walk to score the tying run and after Dominguez struck out in the least competitive at-bat of his season, Volpe cleared the bases with a three-run double to give the Yankees a 4-1 lead.

“It’s been everyone, up and down the line, the whole season,” Volpe said. “And tomorrow, it’ll be someone else.”

The score remained 4-1 until the Yankees loaded the bases with no outs again in the eighth, but managed to only plate one run on a Wells sacrifice fly. Unable to break the game open, Weaver was used in the ninth with a four-run lead and after making things interesting in a bad way on Sunday in Colorado, he did the same against he Angels before ending the game and securing the win. Based on Weaver’s recent usage, I don’t think he will pitch again until the Dodgers series this weekend.

8. The Yankees finished the game with six hits and three walks. Four of those hits came in the fourth, one in the fifth and one in the eighth. They went down in order in six innings and made the one big inning stand up. They were able to make it stand up because Yarbrough was awesome once again. Yarbrough has now made four starts this season with each one better than the last.

9. Yarbrough was forced to start on May 3 after Clarke Schmidt was a late scratch and held the Rays to one run over four innings. Then eight days later he held the A’s to two runs over five innings. Ten days after that, he limited the Rangers to one run over five innings, matching Jacob deGrom and against the Angels he held them to one run on two hits over six innings.

“I’ve never been the guy to really blow up a radar gun,” Yarbrough said. “I’ve really had to understand how to get guys out.”

Yarbrough has been outstanding. He has pitched in middle relief, long relief, as a spot starter and now as a member of the rotation. He has dealt with five eight days between starts, 10 days and five days.

10. Carlos Rodon gets the ball on Tuesday against the left-handed Tyler Anderson. The Yankees will also see a lefty in Yusei Kikuchi in the series finale. (Kikuchi seemed to always have their number as a Blue Jay.) Goldschmidt and DJ LeMahieu will be back in the lineup with either rice or Grisham and Jorbit Vivas headed to the bench. It will be another late start, and thankfully, there’s only three of those left this season.

1. The Yankees played a one-run game against the Rangers on Wednesday and … WON! Yes, the Yankees won a game decided by one run, beating the Rangers 4-3. 

A night after Will Warren pitched the best game of his career against Patrick Corbin, Ryan Yarbrough followed it up by matching Jacob deGrom through five strong innings. Before the game, I wrote:

You have to think two runs is the ceiling of what the Yankees can expect as long as deGrom is in the game. Yarbrough needs to match him until the bullpens get involved.

deGrom allowed two runs in the seven innings he pitched and Yarbrough matched him for the five innings he was in the game. Once the bullpens got involved the Yankees came back and won.

2. It was a win that almost wasn’t. Aaron Boone did everything he possibly could with his bullpen management to lead the Yankees to a loss, but the Yankees’ offense over the final three innings was too much for Boone’s incompetence to overcome.

Boone’s nonsense began in the seventh inning. Yarbrough gave the Yankees five innings off one-run ball and Boone went to Jonathan Loaisiga for the sixth. Loaisiga got two quick outs before loading the bases, which led to Boone to ask Tim Hill to get out of the jam and get the final out of the sixth. Hill did his job and the game remained tied at 1 through six.

In the seventh, Boone sent Hill back out despite lefty mashers Jake Burger and Kyle Higashioka due up. If there’s one thing that duo does well, it’s hit left-handed pitching. If there’s one thing Hill doesn’t do well, it’s face right-handed hitting. Lefties are hitting .086/.158/.086 against Hill this year. Righties are hitting .311/.354/.578 against him. Sure enough, Boone’s stupidity backfired and Burger hunted a first-pitch fastball from Hill and hit it into the seats in right-center to give the Rangers a 2-1 lead.

Even though Hill finished the sixth, because he started the seventh, he had to face three batters. After the Burger home run Hill bounced back to retire Higashioka and Josh Smith. The Rangers’ lineup was going to turn over with Sam Haggerty, so who did Boone think was best suited to get the Rangers’ leadoff man? Ian Hamilton, of course! The same Ian Hamilton who couldn’t close out a five-run ninth the night before was now going to face the top of the Rangers’ lineup in a one-run game. Like Burger, Haggerty hunted a first-pitch fastball, got it, and hit it into the second deck in right field. 3-1 Rangers. After allowing another base hit, Hamilton finally got the last out of the seventh.

3. The Yankees got a run back in the bottom of the seventh when Cody Bellinger destroyed a deGrom middle-middle fastball for his eighth home run. The game was back to being a one-run game, and who better to keep the deficit right where it was than Yerry De los Santos, the last man in the bullpen who, in his last appearance, couldn’t close out a six-run lead in the ninth inning against the Mets on Friday. De los Santos allowed two singles, a stolen base and a walk in the inning, but managed to escape his own mess without giving up a run.

In the bottom of the eighth, Bruce Bochy went to left-hander Robert Garcia. Garcia got DJ LeMahieu to ground out before Paul Goldschmidt drew a one-out, pinch-hit walk, Trent Grisham followed Goldschmidt with a walk of his own to put two on with one out. Boone idiotically had Aaron Judge batting third instead of second, so instead of forcing Bochy to go to a righty to face Judge and then the righty would also have to face Ben Rice and Bellinger, Bochy was able to leave his lefty in to face Rice, who hit a weak fly ball for the second out. Bochy then went to his closer Luke Jackson, who got ahead of Judge before throwing a middle-middle fastball Judge smoked to left for a base hit. Goldschmidt raced home to tie the game, but right after he touched the plate, Grisham was thrown out trying to advance to third to end the inning, meeting the Yankees’ quota of at least one fundamental breakdown per game. It would have been nice to have Bellinger up with the go-ahead run on second base, but instead, Grisham thought it would be better if he could get into betting scoring position.

The game was tied at 3 through eight and then Boone showed the world why he can’t be trusted under any circumstance.

4. The old adage is you use your closer in the ninth inning of a tie game at home because there won’t be a save opportunity (though anyone still managing to a statistic in 2025, like Boone, is a complete idiot). Here was Luke Weaver’s recent workload entering Wednesday:

Thursday: No game
Friday: 2 pitches
Saturday: 0 pitches
Sunday: 0 pitches
Monday: 2 pitches

Weaver had thrown four pitches over the last five days. Remember when Boone didn’t use him in the ninth inning of a tie game at home on Saturday against the Mets (and the Yankees lost) because he had pitched on three of the last four days, even though he had only thrown two pitches on Friday? Well, Weaver then wasn’t needed for anything other than two pitches over the next three days.

As rested as Weaver will ever be, it was easy to see Boone pitching him in the ninth and then again in the 10th if the game went to extra innings. But there was Del los Santos standing on the Yankee Stadium mound with Haggerty and the top of the Rangers’ lineup due up in the ninth.

I have documented every nonsensical decision Boone has made since becoming Yankees manager in 2018, and of the thousands of examples, the decision to let Del los Santos start the ninth inning on Wednesday is easily in the Top 10. It may be in the Top 5.

There were two possibilities for Boone’s decision:

1. He was trying to steal outs in the ninth inning of a tie game with the last man in the bullpen against the top of the opposing lineup.

2. He didn’t call down to the bullpen in time to get Weaver ready to start the ninth.

Either Boone was incompetent in that he didn’t have Weaver ready or he was incompetent for trying to steal outs with De los Santos. Either way, he showed he’s incompetent.

YES had shown Weaver warming up earlier, so it couldn’t be the second possibility, which means Boone felt the last man in his bullpen had a better chance of retiring Haggerty than his all-world closer. Haggerty singled to lead off the ninth. It was the best-case outcome. De los Santos wasn’t going to retire Haggerty, but at least he held him to one base. What if Haggerty had put one in the seats like he had against Hamilton and the Rangers took the lead?

Once Haggerty reached base, Boone called for Weaver. It took Weaver six pitches to get three outs against the top of the Rangers’ lineup.

In the bottom of the ninth, with one out, Jasson Dominguez hit the Yankees’ first walk-off home run since 2022 and saved all Yankees fans from having to watch Boone screw up another extra-inning game.

5. I used to joke that Boone as Yankees manager was a social experiment, but now I believe it. There’s no logical reason for his decision to have Del los Santos start the ninth other than he’s fucking with everyone. If you can’t see how in over his head Boone continues to be, I don’t know what you’re watching. The closer the score and the more involved he becomes, the worse off the Yankees are. And his choices aren’t resigned to only the regular season. We have mountains of poor moves in the postseason when the stakes are the highest to evaluate him on, including 2018 ALDS Games 3 and 4, 2019 ALCS Game 2, 2020 ALDS Game 2, 2021 wild-card game, 2022 ALDS Games 2 and 3, 2022 ALCS Games 2, 3 and 4, 2023 … oh that’s right he missed the postseason completely despite 40 percent of the league getting in and 2024 World Series Game 1. Boone is a professional idiot.

6. Judge needs to bat second every game. It doesn’t matter what hand the pitcher throws with: Judge bats second. Boone continues to screw with Judge in the 2- or 3-hole depending on the day’s starter rather than leaving him in the spot that will get him more plate appearances. Grisham and Rice aren’t exactly Johnny Damon and Derek Jeter at the top of the lineup. The place of Judge shouldn’t be impacted by either being in the lineup. (The duo went 0-for-7 with a walk and four strikeouts on Wednesday.)

7. Another two-hit game for Bellinger to extend his hitting streak to 15 games. He’s hitting .377/.441/1.130 over his last 68 plate appearances. This is the guy I used to watch hit at 11:30 p.m. for the Dodgers. The guy that played himself out of the Dodgers’ future plans. I don’t know how long this will last, but it’s a lot more fun to watch this Bellinger than whatever he was from Opening Day through April.

8. Austin Wells went 0-for-2 with a walk and two strikeouts on Tuesday and 0-for-3 with three strikeouts on Wednesday. Over the last two weeks, he’s hitting .129/.256/.290. He has one multi-hit game since April 27 and is down to .200/.269/.443 on the year.

9. Hamilton may want to throw some scoreless innings soon before he finds himself as the odd man out in the bullpen. Here is his line over his last six games: 4.1 IP, 5 H, 8 R, 8 ER, 5 BB, 6 K, 2 HR, 16.62 ERA, 2.309 WHIP. He’s pitching himself off the team.

10. The win on Wednesday clinched the series for the Yankees for their fifth straight series win. They are now 10-3 over their last 13 games and have opened up a five-game loss column lead in the AL East.

If the weather allows for the series finale on Thursday, it will be Carlos Rodon against Nathan Eovaldi. Eovaldi remains my most hated pitcher in all of baseball for what he was a Yankee and what he became with the Red Sox. He has been exceptional this season with a 1.61 ERA, a league-leading 2.18 FIP and a league-leading 0.766 WHIP. He has only allowed 39 hits, eight walks and three home runs over 61 1/3 innings. If the Yankees are going to beat him and sweep the Rangers, they’re going to need Rodon to match him the way Warren and Yarbrough matched Corbin and deGrom. They’re going to need the offense to do just enough and their manager to not screw it all up.