The Good, the Bad and the Ugly From Yankees' Loss in Game 1 of ALDS

The Yankees had the tying run at the plate all game long despite being four outs from getting no-hit in a postseason game for the first time in franchise history.

Sports Illustrated's Michael Zeno breaks down everything that went right (and wrong) for the Yankees in Game 1 of the ALDS. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

It was a night to forget at Tropicana Field for the Yankees on Saturday, as they fell 1-0 in a pitcher's duel to the Rays to open the American League Division Series in demoralizing fashion.

Despite the loss, there were some good performances and decisions from the Yankees in Game 1, just the same as there were plenty of bad and ugly things to talk about.

Let's break it down.

The good

George Lombard Jr.

How do you get put in the "good" category with zero times reaching base? Well, on a day when absolutely nobody had it offensively, you take what you can get. While Lombard went 0-for-3 with a strikeout, the two times he put it in play were two of the best pieces of hitting on either side in Game 1; they just didn't find turf.

In his first at-bat in the second inning, he got a hold of a 1-1 sinker that Drew Rasmussen left down the middle and roped it on a line to right field, only for it to be caught by Victor Mesa Jr. at the wall. The swing, which went 346 feet at 102 mph, would've been a home run at Yankee Stadium.

In his third at-bat to end the seventh against Rasmussen, he didn't get the same type of cookie that he nearly drove out of the yard in his first at-bat, but he made pretty good contact on a 1-2 fastball at the top of the zone, driving it 392 feet to dead center field, only for it to be caught.

Both swings qualified as barrels, which have a .719 batting average league-wide this season, but neither was a hit. Just unfortunate.

Gerrit Cole

Ultimately, when the Yankees debated over who to start in Game 1 of this series, they were looking for this type of outing.

Would you like six or seven shutout innings? Sure, but considering the team's rested bullpen from a low-stress Wild Card Series, they would've absolutely taken five one-run innings, which is what they got from Gerrit Cole in his first postseason start since Game 5 of the 2024 World Series.

Gerrit Cole's performance was one of the few bright spots for the Yankees in Game 1. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

His home run woes wound up costing the game, as Jonathan Aranda's home run proved to be the deciding blow, but he found a way to get through five innings despite laboring through three with a lot of hard contact. He came out on just 80 pitches due to a lefty lane for Ryan Weathers, but did enough to give the Yankees a chance to win.

Aaron Boone's decisions

In a 1-0 game, you have to make tough decisions as a manager. Unfortunately, not many of them presented themselves due to a comatose offense, but the few ones that had to be made were made correctly.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone got Paul Blackburn up and throwing in the fourth inning after Cole got beat up in the third, but stuck with his longtime ace as he tore through the bottom of the Rays' order. There was certainly a case to take him out in the third time through against the dangerous top of the order, but he boldly kept him in and was rewarded when Cole won an incredible 12-pitch battle with Junior Caminero to finish five innings.

In the bullpen, he elected to go to Weathers in his first outing since late August against a lefty trio of Rays, whom he retired with ease. Blackburn and Brent Headrick got it done from there, keeping the game in reach for an offense that never woke up.

There were extremely few opportunities to use that six-man bench in this one when Rasmussen went eight innings and handed the ball directly to the right-handed closer Bryan Baker, but he took the swing when he had the chance by going to Giancarlo Stanton for his first at-bat in over five months. There was nobody else to go to, and taking the chance with Stanton over Ryan McMahon was worth it.

Austin Wells's 8th-inning at-bat

The only hit of the game by the Yankees came from their backstop with two outs in the eighth, with the whole baseball world watching to see whether Rasmussen could become the first player since Roy Halladay to throw a no-hitter on his own in a playoff game.

Austin Wells did everything he could to spark a Game 1 comeback for the Yankees, but it didn't work out. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

After overturning a terrible strike call to start the AB for his third successful challenge of the night, Wells jumped on a sinker that stayed up and slashed it down the right-field line for an extra-base hit. Maybe in another world, that would spark a Yankees' comeback, but the decision he made after leaving the batter's box will unfortunately be remembered much more than the hit that caused it.

The bad

The entire Yankees' offense

There were a few good swings that found gloves in frustrating fashion and a pair of walks from Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Ben Rice, but other than that, it just wasn't even close to good enough from an offense that is used to getting beat up by Rasmussen.

After all, you don't earn the distinction of being the single best starting pitcher in history against the Yankees (min. 50 innings) by just having a good start of two. If not for the six-run outburst in early July (coincidentally the last time the Rays lost a Rasmussen start), his ERA would be closer to 1.00.

If the Yankees want to win this series, they're probably going to have to beat Rasmussen in either Game 4 or Game 5. To do that, they're going to need to be a lot more competitive, or at bare minimum, get him out of the game a helluva lot sooner than eight innings.

Gerrit Cole's 3rd-inning pitch sequencing

Cole had a good outing and gave the Yankees a chance to win, but any time you give up a run, there's room for criticism. Let's go back to that third inning that proved to be the difference.

The warning signs were there from the start of the inning. Despite jumping ahead of Yandy Diaz, Cole grooved a pair of fastballs in the zone that he fortunately got away with. Maybe it was the fact that he was using his sinker?

Against Aranda, he had the right idea early in the at-bat. After jumping ahead on a slider below the zone that was fouled off, he threw three consecutive fastballs to a guy who performs poorly against four-seamers, especially ones above 95 mph. Unfortunately for Cole, he overthrew two of those fastballs, putting him in an unfavorable situation.

With the bases empty and Caminero lurking on deck, Cole gave in with a changeup on the plate that was promptly crushed for a home run. This came after Aranda just got under a hanging slider in his last at-bat. The move here was probably to keep pounding fastballs and daring him to hit them, especially considering his ability to crush off-speed.

Two batters later, Cole started Liam Hicks with three consecutive curveballs before grooving a 2-1 fastball that was crushed for a double off the wall. He got out of the inning one pitch later, but his shakiness that inning may have cost him trust down the road.

The ugly

Austin Wells's baserunning blunder

It's one thing to lose. It's one thing to be shut out in a playoff environment. It's one way to do every little thing that led to this loss for the Yankees.

It's an entirely different thing to have a big-time blunder like what Wells did in the eighth inning, especially considering all the context in and around the play.

For Wells, a very slow catcher, to think he could reach third base on a ball that wasn't misplayed by Mesa in the corner was foolish in itself, but there were multiple issues with this situation outside of the decision in a vacuum.

For one, his third base coach, Luis Rojas, had a firm stop sign up. Wells committed to the run and didn't pick him up until he was halfway to third (h/t MLB). There was also the fact that there were two outs in the inning, so an extra 90 feet mattered little in the grand scheme of things.

Drew Rasmussen's no-hitter is over but the Rays team up to get Austin Wells at third base 😮 pic.twitter.com/WyRUMuvneE

— MLB (@MLB) October 4, 2026

Wells's postgame justification about the turf playing fast could make sense if there was a weird ricochet that made this a closer play, but he was gunned down by at least 10 feet. You take your chances on a two-out single after this, not going for third as a slow catcher in a ballpark without the nooks and crannies to allow for weird triples. There's even a justification if there's one out. There's nothing here.

It might not have mattered given how locked in Rasmussen was, which is what makes it worse. Instead of just talking about a bad offensive effort, the conversation about fundamentals and how the Rays "play the game better" than you will follow them into Game 2, even if the Rays just pitched a shutout and hit one singular home run—two tenets of the Yankees' success.

Wells has had a very good start to this postseason offensively and has been even better defensively, stealing multiple strikeouts so far this postseason, but he'll need to make up for his baserunning mistake down the road.

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