Yankees Clinch Playoff With Walkoff

Surely, the Yankees should be able to win a home game against the Chicago White Sox, the worst team in baseball these last couple of years.

They almost didn't. They nearly wasted a nice start by Luis Gil, who went 6 innings, allowing 2 runs on 4 hits and 2 walks. But because he threw 89 pitches, Aaron Boone did not send him out for the 7th.

Actually, the bullpen wasn't the problem at all. Fernando Cruz pitched a scoreless 7th, Tim Hill got the 1st 2 outs in the 8th, and Luke Weaver got the last 4 outs. Overall, the pitching was just what the doctor ordered.

Pitching like that deserves runs. In the 2nd inning, the Yankees got a leadoff walk from Jazz Chisholm, a single from Anthony Volpe, and a double by Austin Wells. But they stranded 2 runners in the 1st inning, 1 in the 3rd, 1 in the 4th, 1 in the 6th, and 2 in the 8th; and had runners eliminated on a failed stretching of a single into a double by Ben Rice in the 5th, and a double play in the 7th. And the Pale Hose's runs came in the 6th, when neither Cody Bellinger nor Trent Grisham seemed to want to catch a Kyle Teel looper, and Colson Montgomery followed that with a home run off Gil. 2-1, White Sox.

Bottom of the 9th. Volpe led off with a single, a rare 2-hit game for him. Wells singled. We were in business. But Grisham grounded into a double play, eliminating himself and Wells, moving Volpe to 3rd. With 1st base open, Aaron Judge was walked intentionally. Bellinger drew a walk on Brandon Eisert, and ball 4 was a wild pitch, enabling Volpe to score, and Judge to go to 2nd.

It was somewhat appropriate that the winning run came on the same kind of hit that started the South Siders' now-gone lead. José Cabellero hit one to center field, and Michael A. Taylor probably should have caught it. He didn't, letting it drop in front of him. Judge came around 3rd, and slid home with the winning run.

Yankees 3, White Sox 2. The win clinched a Playoff berth, the Yankees' 60th postseason appearance.

In the locker room after the game, Boone told the Yankees, "We've been through a lot already. This is our first box to check. We gotta get in. We're in. Don't take that shit for granted. We are in the Playoffs. We got a lot more to do, right? We got a lot of bigger goals. But enjoy this celebration."

The Boston Red Sox, who needed a win to keep their Playoff hopes alive, beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 4-1 at the Rogers Centre in Toronto. That reduced the Jays' lead in the American League Eastern Division to just 1 game. However, under the rules now in place, it's really 2 games, since the Jays own the 1st tiebreaker, head-to-head play. If the teams finish tied for 1st, the Jays get the title and 1 of the top 3 seeds in the AL Playoffs, instead of the old version, which would have required a Playoff for the Division title.

But that's 2 games with 5 to play. The Yankees are still very much in that race.

Tonight, the Yankees send Max Fried to the mound, against Fraser Ellard.