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Now, Kiner-Falefa appeared to be struggling even more under the brightest lights. He’d dove over a first-inning Josh Naylor grounder that allowed the game’s first run to cross home plate, threw errantly on an Andrés Giménez grounder that could have ended the sixth inning, and lobbed a ninth-inning throw from shallow left field that allowed Myles Straw to take second base on his bloop single. Boone said he sensed Kiner-Falefa was playing tentatively, consciously trying “not to make that mistake.”
Kiner-Falefa received a text message from Boone the morning of Game 4, informing him that he would not be in the starting lineup. Instead, Oswaldo Cabrera would start at shortstop, with Aaron Hicks in left field.
It was win or winter. By the seventh inning of Game 4, as waves of fatigue began to crash in his prized right arm and legs, Cole had already achieved his objective of cutting through noise and finding his postseason focus. Still, Cole dug for more, vowing to leave no ounce of adrenaline unused. Cole pumped his 110th and final pitch of the night through the strike zone, celebrating his eighth strikeout with a fist pump and a primal roar. With his team’s backs against the wall, the $324 million man had delivered, leading the Yankees to a 4–2 victory.
“When they told me I was going Game 4, you know there’s an opportunity to clinch or go home,” Cole said. “I didn’t approach the game any different. I just went out there and did my job.”
Harrison Bader hit his third homer of the ALDS, a two-run shot off Cal Quantrill, while Holmes and Wandy Peralta split the final six outs. Josh Naylor homered in the fourth off Cole, an at-bat punctuated by Naylor’s enthusiastic “Rock the Baby” celebration around the bases. Cole said he didn’t see Naylor’s antics during the game, but someone alerted Cole later, and the hurler was unimpressed.
“Yeah. Whatever. It’s cute,” Cole said.
The clubs jetted to New York, where fans endured an infuriating delay of 2 ½ hours before a worsening forecast of inclement weather prompted Major League Baseball to push Game 5 back a day. The beer and chicken buckets did brisk business on the concourses, and the players wondered if they were playing; Boone had looked up from one of his six weather-related Zoom calls to see Judge darkening the hallway of his office door, uniform jersey buttoned and eye black applied, asking: “What’s going on?”
The green blob hovering over New Jersey on the radar screen looked threatening, but the conditions in the Bronx seemed playable. At one point during the delay, Cleveland outfielder Myles Straw—the same one who’d called the Yankees’ faithful the “worst fan base on the planet” during their heated April series—emerged with a football, playing catch with a few hardy patrons behind the third base dugout. When the stadium fun police put a stop to that, at least something was raining down—boos.
Many of those same customers returned for Game 5, and it proved worth the wait. Stanton and Judge both homered to support Nestor Cortes’s gritty effort as the Yankees sent Cleveland home with a 5–1 victory, confirming that for the third time in six years, they would travel to Houston with a trip to the World Series on the line. Stanton flipped his bat emphatically after a three-run homer off starter Aaron Civale, who recorded only one out.
“We threw the first punch, and had them chasing us the whole game,” Stanton said.
When Judge clubbed a solo shot in the second inning off Sam Hentges (homer no. 64), he marched toward a television camera stationed near the first-base side of the Yankees’ dugout, grabbing the interlocking “NY” on his jersey and kissing it—an uncharacteristic gesture that sparked thoughts of his pending free agency. Judge claimed that it had been for the fans, saying that he had “been watching a lot of Premier League soccer games, and I think that got the best of me.”
Asked about that moment months later, Judge confirmed that he was thinking about more than the English football league system: “I think I said from day one, I wanted to end my career here and finish in pinstripes.… Your emotions kind of get the best of you in moments like that. I don’t know if I was dropping too many bread crumbs. I think I was just giving you guys the whole loaf throughout the whole year, of where I wanted to be.”
It was no surprise that the path to success would have to run through the Astros, who dominated the AL West with a 106-win campaign. Yet, already in October, the favored Cardinals, Blue Jays, Mets, Dodgers, and Braves had been dispatched by teams with fewer regular-season victories. These Yankees hoped to be the next to upset. A crowd of 48,178 deliriously filed out of Yankee Stadium, filling Babe Ruth Plaza and marching toward the elevated subway along 161st Street.
Over and over, they chanted: “We want Houston!” They would get their wish.
* * *
Roger Clemens wore denim jeans, a tight-fitting black polo shirt, and a camouflage ballcap with the Texas Longhorns’ logo as he stood in the rear of the press box at Minute Maid Park, having just tossed a ceremonial first pitch across home plate. It was the top of the first inning, and the seven-time Cy Young Award winner was formulating a game plan for how the younger version of himself might have handled the Yankees’ best hitter.
“Very carefully,” Clemens said, with a chuckle. “Here, you could pitch him away a little bit easier than in. I’ll be curious to see how both of those guys, him and Stanton, go at it with the short left field. At Yankee Stadium—even though I pitched at the old Yankee Stadium—it’s still a chip shot there. The famous line from a movie I was in, Cobb, was: ‘My sister Florence can hit the ball out of right field at Yankee Stadium.’ Those guys are strong enough to hit it out anywhere. I’d be careful with him. Solo home runs are good. You want to stay away from the three-run homer.”
Clemens and the Astros’ pitching staff shared that opinion. Long balls with men on base seemed to be the Yankees’ best chance of pulling off an upset in the American League Championship Series. As Cashman watched batting practice on the field at Minute Maid Park on the afternoon of October 19, exchanging pleasantries with Houston manager Dusty Baker and general manager James Click, he came to the unsettling realization that his team would have to play a near-perfect series to advance.
The Yankees weren’t accustomed to being the underdogs, but this matchup saw them firmly ensconced in that role. Andrew Benintendi’s right wrist still hadn’t healed, and though DJ LeMahieu gamely insisted he could play on the fractured sesamoid bone in his right big toe, the medical staff still said he was too compromised to help. Cashman resolved that they would do their best with the personnel they had remaining.
Justin Verlander outpitched Jameson Taillon in Game 1, a 4–2 Astros win. Taking the mound in a ballpark that once played host to his childhood heroes, Taillon bobbed and weaved into the fifth inning, but nothing ever felt comfortable against the high-octane Houston lineup. He’d tried not to be fazed when he spotted Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio watching from the seats; in Verlander, there was a different Hall of Fame–level talent to be concerned with.
“It’s a really good lineup with a ton of playoff experience,” Taillon said. “It’s their sixth ALCS in a row. They’ve played in big moments, they’ve played under pressure and they’ve seen us a good amount. You have to have everything going.”
When a one-out double chased Taillon in the fifth inning, Boone chose Schmidt to extinguish the flames. It had been four days since Schmidt landed on the wrong side of a blown save in the Yanks’ deflating Game 3 loss in the ALDS, and he now savored a moment of redemption, dotting a sinker that induced Kyle Tucker to hit into an inning-ending double play.
Schmidt whirled and pumped his fist, a display that tempted Boone to keep the good vibes rolling. Despite swelling his roster to thirteen pitchers for this round, the manager couldn’t find the right buttons to push. Houston took control in the sixth, as Schmidt surrendered homers to Yuli Gurriel and Chas McCormick before exiting. Boone said that the Yanks “knew it was going to be a slog getting through those middle innings,” and it had been.
Verlander was excellent, striking out eleven, though he wobbled early. After Judge contributed a tremendous diving catch in the first inning that robbed Alex Bregman of an extra-base hit, potentially saving two runs, Bader belted his fourth homer of the postseason. The daring deadline trade with the Cardinals, in which Cashman had shed a serviceable starter in Jordan Montgomery to bring in an outfielder who spent weeks limping around their clubhouse in a walking boot, was suddenly looking like a stroke of genius. Somewhat improbably after their grueling ALDS battle and early-morning arrival in Houston, the Yankees had a lead on Verlander.
Martín Maldonado touched Taillon for a game-tying double, but New York was set up in the third when Anthony Rizzo walked and Giancarlo Stanton smoked a double. A fly ball would have restored the advantage; instead, Josh Donaldson struck out and Matt Carpenter was caught looking—the second of four strikeouts for Carpenter, whom despite his best efforts was not ready for prime time; he was essentially trying to rehab from his foot injury against elite postseason pitching. That began a string of six consecutive strikeouts for Verlander, who held New York to just three hits.
In Game 2, the Yankees’ last best chance to depart with an ALCS split rocketed off Judge’s bat in the eighth inning. Judge’s opposite-field drive drew a gasp from the sellout crowd at Minute Maid Park, soaring like many of the 62 home runs the slugger launched during his regular-season chase for history. Judge’s teammates leapt toward the dugout’s top steps; this one was destined to land in the seats, they seemed certain. But Judge felt the wind would keep it in, and soon after Kyle Tucker’s spikes crunched into the warning track, the rest of the world knew for sure. The Yankees’ hopes were dashed four outs later, absorbing a 3–2 loss.
It was a cruel dagger for the visitors that, according to Statcast, Judge’s 345-foot fly ball would have been a home run in precisely one ballpark: Yankee Stadium. Kyle Higashioka asked for the exit velocity; told that it had been 106.3 mph, the catcher nodded and said, “I was kind of amazed it didn’t go out.” Giancarlo Stanton said he thought Judge’s ball might have left the park if the roof had been closed; with first-pitch temperatures at an enjoyable seventy-eight degrees on a clear evening, however, there was no need for controlled conditions. “Who would have thought,” Boone said. “I think the roof [being] open kind of killed us.”
Yet that decision was made by Major League Baseball, not the Astros, who typically prefer the louder atmosphere of a closed roof. But the Yanks’ shortcomings were not just one lifted fly ball into swirling crosswinds—rather, the greater issue was the thirty whiffs that had come from New York’s lineup through eighteen innings. After striking out seventeen times in Game 1, the Yanks added thirteen in Game 2, with Houston starter Framber Valdez fanning nine.
“The idea ain’t just to touch it. We’ve got to score,” Boone said. “They’re about as tough as there is to score against, but we’ve got to figure out a way.”
The series shifted back to Yankee Stadium, where the Yankees posted an MLB-best 57-24 home record (.704) during the regular season. But these Astros were too much to contain. Boone’s Game 3 walk toward the mound seemed to transpire in slow motion, each step measured across the infield grass as he approached the gaggle of Yankees clustered around Cole. The bases were loaded with none out, and seemingly with some hesitation, the manager extended his right finger to summon a fresh arm. All three runs came around to score against reliever Lou Trivino, and no return punch would come in a 5–0 loss.
Later, Boone would second-guess his decision not to stick with Cole, explaining that he’d hoped Trivino would generate weak contact to induce a double play, rather than asking Cole to try for a strikeout.
“That’s one,” Boone said, “where I feel like I should have stayed with Gerrit.”
Ultimately, it wouldn’t have mattered much, since the Yankees didn’t score. Stoking memories of the combined no-hitter in June (and a preview of what the Astros would do in the World Series against the Phillies eleven days later), the Yankees were held to just one hit through the first eight innings by Cristian Javier and four relievers.
Judge went hitless in four at-bats, striking out twice, and again heard boos. It was tame compared to what Josh Donaldson was hearing in the series. Yet in Houston’s bullpen, the Astros’ relievers couldn’t believe what they had witnessed.
“I don’t understand why you would boo a guy that has given you nothing but joy, especially this year,” closer Ryan Pressly said. Though the narrative of fans jeering Judge after his historic season was gaining traction, Boone said that he believed it was overblown.
“Look, he’s beloved here. He knows that,” Boone said. “He loves it here. I think he loves the fan base. He’s one of those guys that truly isn’t affected by that. He understands there’s going to be moments in time that literally everyone probably experiences at some point if you wear this uniform long enough, even if you’re great.”
Judge reminded his teammates that their backs had been against the wall all year, “even in this postseason, especially when we went down [two games to one] to Cleveland.” Bader said the Yankees faced “a mountain,” but needing to win four straight against Houston felt like Everest.
In MLB history, there had been thirty-nine previous teams to fall into an 0-3 hole during a best-of-seven series. Only one emerged on the winning side: the 2004 Boston Red Sox.
* * *
Eighteen Octobers had passed since Kevin Millar prowled the Fenway Park infield during batting practice for a seemingly decided American League Championship Series, the camera-friendly Boston first baseman warning anyone who would listen: “Don’t let us win tonight.” Within the Yankees’ clubhouse walls, it could have easily happened on the morning of October 23, hours before Game 4 of the ALCS—because it did.
A video recapping Millar’s speech, Dave Roberts’s stolen base, and Boston’s comeback from a staggering deficit to topple, yes, the Yankees, was distributed electronically among New York players and coaches. The video was sent by Chad Bohling, the Yankees’ director of mental conditioning. It was not uncommon for Bohling to send similar clips, from different sports or walks of life; earlier in the season, players and coaches had viewed motivational wisdom from players like the late Kobe Bryant. The point was that an 0-3 hole was difficult to climb out of, but not impossible.
But the ’04 Red Sox? Yuck. If only there had been a different comeback to highlight.
“I think [the message was] just the belief that they had,” Boone said. “They had confidence; you see Millar, ‘Don’t let us win one.’ ”
With talk of that curse-reversing squad of “idiots” thick in the air, ESPN broadcaster Eduardo Pérez happened to be a guest in Boone’s office when David Ortiz popped up on the television screen. Ortiz was wearing a Philadelphia Eagles jersey as part of an NFL pregame show, and Pérez noticed Boone—a diehard Eagles fan since childhood—had a green-and-white Brian Dawkins throwback jersey hanging near his private restroom. On a lark, Pérez placed a FaceTime call, and Big Papi answered.
“He was like, ‘Dude! You guys have got to do what we did back then,’ ” Pérez said. “He said, ‘Just keep the energy, one game at a time. That’s what [Ortiz] told [Boone], but with his passion, which I definitely cannot replicate. But he just said, ‘Hey man, just go play and have fun.’ So what, basically.’ ” So what? David Cone had retired by 2004, but he played with key members of that club, like Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, and Mariano Rivera. As he stood on the field at Yankee Stadium, preparing for a YES Network hit, Cone said that drawing upon the ’04 Red Sox for inspiration probably wouldn’t have gone over well with his pals.
“I know there’s some people in Red Sox Nation laughing right now,” Cone said. “I understand rallying the troops and the intent. There’s not a lot of examples down 3-0. I think there’s some irony there that’s not to be missed.”
Of the motivational tactic, Jeter said: “I still don’t like to talk about [the 2004 ALCS] myself. It makes me sick just thinking about it.”
Added Posada: “Different times, different attitudes, and definitely different type players.”
Ultimately, the Yankees could not “slay the dragon,” as Boone had quipped earlier in the season about their likely Houston–New York ALCS matchup—unlike in ’17 and ’19, they were not even able to win a single game. Houston defeated the Yanks for the ninth time in eleven games, including the 6–5 loss in Game 4. For the third time in six years, the Astros were toasting the final out of the Yanks’ season.
“I said we needed to slay that dragon. We haven’t done it yet, and that hurts,” Boone said. “It’s also a motivating factor to try to continue to get better. I looked at that Astros team, and whether it was their four starters they were rolling out there, or the depth and health of their bullpen—I felt they were at their best.”
Cashman said the abrupt ending “sucked for us all, and for our fans and ownership the worst of all.” Judge also did not mince words in the aftermath, sticking to an all-too-familiar script. “If we’re not the last team standing, it doesn’t matter what you do or what happened. It’s a failure,” Judge said. “We came up short. We didn’t finish our goal.”
On a brisk evening that started about ninety minutes late due to rain, the Yankees built an early three-run lead against Lance McCullers Jr., snapping a fourteen-inning scoreless streak that dated to the fourth inning of Game 2. But Nestor Cortes exited in the third inning with a groin injury and, though Harrison Bader continued his tremendous October with a fifth postseason home run, Gleyber Torres committed an error on a critical seventh-inning double-play ball that opened the door for two runs.
Torres said the Yanks “missed too many opportunities,” and though Hal Steinbrenner concurred, he wondered how the series might have looked if Benintendi or LeMahieu could have helped against the dominant Astros pitching staff. They might have scored more runs, but no one could definitively state that Benintendi and LeMahieu alone would have changed the outcome.
