The Yankees committed three errors in the first inning of ALDS Game 2 Monday night, before the Rays had even finished sending five batters to the plate, and that’s not a bad bounce. That’s a $300 million roster that stopped trusting its own hands the second the lights got real. Ryan McMahon booted a grounder from Yandy Díaz that a Little Leaguer catches on muscle memory. Jazz Chisholm Jr. airmailed a potential double play into shallow right field, and the run that scored off it was the first run of the game. Austin Wells reached out and touched a bat that wasn’t his to touch, erasing a strikeout with catcher’s interference.
Three errors in one inning.
Yankees postseason history had never seen that, and nobody in the sport had either — it tied a postseason record for most errors in a first inning that had stood since the 1975 Oakland A’s fell apart against the Red Sox in Game 1 of the ALCS.
Nobody working in professional baseball today has ever watched three errors happen in one inning that actually counted, until Monday night went ahead and delivered it anyway.
What actually bugs me is this roster spends money on everything except the part of baseball you’re supposed to learn for free as a ten-year-old: catch the ball. Ownership writes checks for the bat, the arm, the ace starter. Nobody’s getting a contract bonus clause for “doesn’t panic on a routine grounder in the first inning of an elimination series.” You can scout exit velocity down to the decimal. You can’t scout what a guy’s hands do when the whole building goes quiet at once.
You can’t buy nerve.
The Yankees still had a pulse. Ben Rice hit two solo home runs, which on a normal night is a stat line that wins you the game. Instead it just made a 5-2 final look more respectable than the inning that produced it.
Jazz Chisholm stood at his locker afterward and did the thing nobody wants to do, which is defend a decision while the stadium is still cleaning up the wreckage. Asked if he’d make the same throw again, he said he probably would, he just wanted a better version of it.
https://x.com/snyyankees/status/2107322380586508416
He didn’t dodge the bigger admission, either. “I feel like we beat ourselves today in a lot of ways,” Chisholm said, and that’s about as honest as a postgame quote gets.
Aaron Boone called it “gut-check time,” which is the manager version of saying he doesn’t have sixteen hours to teach grown men how to field grounders again. He also admitted it was “a really rough night to say the least,” which, yeah.
This is now two straight disasters. The Yankees dropped Game 1 too, and the series math is brutal: down 2-0, with Game 3 tonight at Yankee Stadium, 8 p.m., Max Fried against Nick Martinez. Lose this one and the parade doesn’t happen. Neither does Game 4.
The $300-million face of this roster isn’t walking through that clubhouse door to fix anything. Aaron Judge hasn’t played since mid-September, sidelined with a right calf strain and no return date, left off the ALDS roster completely. He’s spent this whole series recovering from that calf strain somewhere that isn’t an on-deck circle, watching four errors happen without him able to do a single thing about any of them.
The part that complicates the take, and it should: these aren’t bad gloves. McMahon’s a plus defender most nights. Chisholm’s arm grades out well by basically every scouting report. Good fielders panic too, especially in October, especially with $300 million riding on every routine play. Call it context, not an excuse.
That’s what makes tonight scarier than the box score.
My dad texted after the final out. One word. A period. Nothing else.
That’s the whole review. Win tonight, or there isn’t a Game 4 worth arguing about.
