They are tired, some of them are broken (or at least have broken fingers), and yet the New York Yankees are one win away from their first pennant since 2009. They outlasted the Cleveland Guardians in ALCS Game 4 on Friday after the two teams spent two days trading haymakers. The ALCS is much a heavyweight fight between the AL's two best teams as it is baseball.
"Not surprised with these guys," Yankees manager Aaron Boone said about the way his team bounced back after the gut-punch loss in Game 3. "Obviously, last night was a really tough loss. And whatever happened today, win, lose, or draw, there's no doubt in my mind we'd come out ready to roll, ready to turn the page."
The Yankees, who visit Cleveland for Game 5 of the ALCS on Saturday night, are an imperfect team buoyed by some of the generation's greatest players. Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, and Giancarlo Stanton have combined to hit seven home runs in the ALCS, every one of them impactful. How would the Yankees respond after that crushing loss in Game 3? With Soto giving the Yankees a two-run lead two batters into Game 4, there was no letdown.
"Gleyber [Torres] gets on, Soto homer, we're off and running," Boone said.
Judge, Soto, and Stanton have more than done their part. The Yankees are a win away from the World Series because others have stepped up, including Torres, including Anthony Volpe, including Alex Verdugo, and including Anthony Rizzo, who's playing with two broken fingers. It was that foursome who built the game-winning rally against Emmanuel Clase in the ninth inning of Game 4.
"I thought the guys did a great job just putting the ball in play," Stanton said about that ninth inning. "It shows you don't got to crush it. You've just got to put it in play and make things happen. Make them make a throw or make a play."
The bullpen bent in Game 4, broke, then bent some more, and eventually closed out the game. Jake Cousins, Clay Holmes, and Mark Leiter Jr. combined to blow a four-run lead in the middle innings. Tommy Kahnle, who threw 44 pitches and 44 changeups in Games 3 and 4, eventually got the 27th out with closer Luke Weaver unavailable due to his recent workload.
"Frankly, I wasn't quite sure how we were going to get there," Boone said about navigating a tired bullpen to the finish line.
This time of year, managers get the blame -- I thought Dodgers manager Dave Roberts did a poor job showing urgency in their NLCS Game 5 loss to the Mets on Friday -- and very rarely get credit for success. That comes with the territory and they know that when they take the job. The players win, the manager loses. It is the way of the world.
In his seventh season in New York, Boone is doing his best work guiding the Yankees, though, like his roster, he is imperfect. He got too cute asking Cousins for a second inning in Game 4, then things unraveled when Holmes entered mid-inning with men on base. Leiter was added to the roster Friday afternoon and was asked to get maybe the biggest outs of the season a few hours later.
"The thing I said to him before the game was you might find yourself in the biggest spot of this game," Boone said about Leiter and his worn-out bullpen. "He was ready for it, and he delivered."
The Yankees have done terrific work building bullpens the last few seasons -- they led the American League in bullpen WAR from 2021-23 -- though this year's unit leaves something to be desired. Ace setup man Jonathan Loáisiga blew out his elbow seven games into the season, Holmes led baseball in blown saves, and Leiter failed to make an impact after coming over at the deadline.
This patchwork unit has been propped up by Weaver, who's been a revelation (Game 3 blown save aside), plus Cousins and lefty Tim Hill, two scrap heap pickups cut loose by the 121-loss Chicago White Sox earlier this year. This bullpen has required a deft touch. It's not manager-proof. And again, Boone has not been perfect, but he's pulled the right strings more often than not.
Boone is polarizing, even more than the typical Yankees manager, and criticism is not unwarranted. His Yankees are sloppy -- how many outs can one team run into? -- and he can be loyal to a fault, whether it's sticking with Verdugo in left field, Isiah Kiner-Falefa at short, or Josh Donaldson at third. Verdugo has rewarded Boone's faith this October. Donaldson and Kiner-Falefa never did.
Yankees players love Boone, though. He has their backs publicly, he's known to say what needs to be said behind closed doors, and he's very even-keeled. Watch Boone talk on a daily basis and you wouldn't be able to tell if it was Game 4 of the ALCS or a random Tuesday game in June. When the manager begins to crack, that's when the players start to lose faith, and Boone never does.
Ultimately, the players play, and the Yankees will go as far as Judge, Soto, and Stanton take them. Things are not coming easy for this Yankees team, though, especially lately with a gassed pitching staff. Boone is not the reason for his team's success but he is a reason. His players love him, he's made the right move more often than not, and the Yankees are a win away from the pennant.
"It's just like, keep moving, keep moving," Boone said before Game 4. "Especially in the playoffs, when I talk to these guys before the series, we're going to do some great things, there's going to be great moments, we're going to make mistakes. You can't get bogged down by it all. You've got to hopefully feed off the energy that is the postseason, but kind of take in every moment, learn from it, and then understand the next play is so important and you've got to keep moving, and the teams that do that well have a chance to be more successful."
