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NEW YORK – Aaron Judge was nowhere to be found on the field at Yankee Stadium. Yet “M-V-P!” chants still resonated through the raucous ballpark.

Judge did not join his teammates on the baseline for pregame introductions. But a total team effort pulled the Yankees through in a virtual must-win game.

There’s still no certainty if or when Judge will take the field this postseason. But for one night, perhaps the most important night of the playoffs – Game 1 of the best-of-three American League wild card series – the Yankees proved they could survive without their three-time Most Valuable Player.

Perhaps that’s because Cam Schlittler has become their most important player.

Schlittler tormented the Boston Red Sox for the second consecutive year in the wild card round, this time getting a massive assist from fellow New England product Ben Rice, the Walpole ace and the Cohasset crusher laying waste to the team they couldn’t avoid growing up.

This time, Schlittler took a two-hit shutout into the seventh inning and Rice drove in six runs as the Yankees moved a massive step toward advancing to the AL Division Series with a 9-0 trouncing of the Red Sox on Tuesday, Sept. 29.

Game 2 is Wednesday night, Boston’s Sonny Gray pitching to save the Red Sox’s season against Yankees lefty Max Fried. Tuesday’s final score might have you believe Game 1 was a laugher.

It was anything but, Schlitter nursing a 1-0 lead into the fifth and a 2-0 lead into the seventh, with Rice quietly laying waste to the Red Sox bullpen until his final, big blast.

That came in the bottom of the eighth inning, a garbage time grand slam off Brayan Bello to make it 9-0 and bring winter nearer New England.

It was Rice’s fourth hit and he tied a Yankees franchise record with his six RBIs, the fifth to do it and the first since Robinson Cano in 2011. Rice, the Dartmouth grad and erudite soul of the Yankee clubhouse, does not necessarily fit the mold of past Yankee greats.

In another fashion, he and Schlittler are both fitting right in.

“If you want to be a legend,” Schlittler said Tuesday, “you’ve got to do it in the postseason.”

Doesn’t he know it. Schlittler’s die was cast in the decisive Game 3 of the 2025 wild-card round, when he struck out 12 Red Sox over eight innings and talked mad smack after, chiding Red Sox fans for goading him on social media.

A year later, Schlittler’s tone mellowed only a bit, noting his good friends from up north came down for the game and while they are Red Sox fans, knew not to poke the bear.

His pitching dominance was nearly identical, though.

Cam Schlittler did something Tuesday night in the Bronx that put him in spectacular pitching company. 

Already a talent so sublime he qualifies as a rivalry separator in the blood feud that is Yankees-Red Sox, Schlittler’s going for bigger than just Sox-killer status: He’s blooming into postseason royalty, too.

The Yankees beat the Red Sox, 9-0, at Yankee Stadium and Schlittler delivered 6.1 scoreless innings, allowing two hits while striking out 10. Going back to last October when he first shredded Boston, he now has two scoreless playoff starts with at least 10 strikeouts in his career, something only five pitchers have accomplished.

And those pitchers are something else – Justin Verlander did it three times and Sandy Koufax, Randy Johnson, Kevin Brown and Cliff Lee did it twice each. Aces all.

"It's very well known that if you want to be a legend, which is obviously the goal, you've got to do it in the postseason,” said Schlittler. “Go out there and have dominant starts and put the team in the position to win.”

The Yankees can advance Wednesday with a victory in Game 2 of the best-of-three AL Wild Card Series. Schlittler knows, as he put it, “the job isn’t finished yet.” But he also said, “We’re heading in the right direction.”

Schlittler will win the AL Cy Young Award later this year following a remarkable regular season. He’s also got a 0.47 ERA in six career starts against the Red Sox, including his eight scoreless innings last October. Tuesday night, he demonstrated numerous times how good he is, to the point where his teammates were marveling afterward.

Anthony Volpe, who started at second base after only playing shortstop behind Schlittler, was agog. "From second base, watching some of these righties, I never had that angle,” Volpe said.

“Some of the swings were so far away from where he was throwing the ball."

Schlittler, who had a 1.95 ERA during the regular season, featured his curveball nearly three times more than usual. The pitch was landing for called strikes or swing-and-misses – he finished four of his strikeouts with it – and it was the perfect antidote for the times Red Sox hitters tried to guess early at his high-90s heat.

Aaron Boone noted that Schlittler and catcher Austin Wells excelled at picking spots to use the curve.

“I thought they did a really nice job of using that off of some guys selling out to the four-seam,” Boone said. “He was filling up the strike zone with it, too, so he was able to get strikes with it if he needed to and, obviously, chase. And then the fastball was great.”

“The amount of miss and weak contact I'm getting with that (the curve), I’m feeling like I'm in a really good spot with it,” Schlittler said.

“Cam was obviously awfully good,” added Boston manager Chad Tracy. “The fastball shapes are well-documented. He’s throwing hard. He also had a good curveball. You know it’s there, but he used it a little bit more often. He landed it, if he wanted to, for strikes. He was able to get it beneath (hitters’ bats) for swing and miss.

“We weren’t able to do much with him.”

When Schlittler finished off the sixth inning with a strikeout of Adley Rutschman on a cutter, he matched his career high with 107 pitches. Boone sent him out to start the seventh and he retired Willson Contreras, Boston’s most dangerous hitter. But then he gave up a hit to Wilyer Abreu and came out of the game.

“No debate to send him out there,” Boone said. 

After Contreras? “I probably should have taken him (out) at that point, but I got a little greedy.” 

The Yanks were trying to squeeze every last out from Schlittler, especially since they took 10 pitchers on the Wild Card roster so they could maximize their hitting options against Boston.

They got 19 outs on 117 pitches from Schlittler. It was plenty, especially considering the way their bats came alive late – Schlittler’s fellow New Englander, Ben Rice, homered twice, including an eighth-inning grand slam.

The pair enjoys beating their hometown team – both are from the Boston area. “It adds like a cool little layer to it,” Rice said of their shared geographical background and success against the Red Sox. “For Cam, too.”

“I mean, we love it,” Schlittler said.

They’ve got to beat the Sox one more time this week to advance. There’s plenty more work Schlittler wants to do.

He wants to be a legend, after all. Pitching like this, he’s well on his way.

San Diego Padres pitcher Michael King was on the way to etching his name into MLB record books, flirting with a no-hitter against the Chicago Cubs during Game 1 of the National League wild card series at Petco Park.

The dream ended on Nico Hoerner's infield single with one out in the seventh inning, with third baseman Manny Machado unable to pick up the ball cleanly.

There have been three no-hitters in MLB postseason history, most recently the Houston Astros' combined no-hitter in the 2022 World Series. Don Larsen (1956 perfect game) and Roy Halladay (2010) are the only other pitchers to have accomplished the feat.

King finished with eight strikeouts in 97 pitches in seven innings, getting the win in the Padres' 8-0 victory.

Here are all of the no-hitters pitched in MLB postseason history:

When he waived his no-trade clause this winter to join the Red Sox, Sonny Gray endeared himself to his new Boston fans by memorably taking a shot at a franchise with whom he did not enjoy his time.

“It feels good to me to go to a place now where it’s easy to hate the Yankees,” Gray said in December, which fans in The Bronx surely will remember on Wednesday when he takes the mound as the biggest obstacle from the Yankees sweeping the wild-card series.

After dropping the opener, 9-0, Tuesday, the Red Sox will give their season to Gray for one of the bigger days of his life. Before the stakes were clear, he was reflective of some of the worst years of his life, which he said snowballed in a way that only became fully apparent in retrospect.

Nearly a decade ago, Gray was shipped from the then-Oakland A’s to the Yankees at the 2017 trade deadline under circumstances that since have come under scrutiny.

Gray has said he “never” wanted to be a Yankee; Brian Cashman later responded that Gray had sent backchannel messages, through the Yankees minor league video coordinator, that he wanted to be in The Bronx and competing for a title.

Regardless, Gray never was happy, did not pitch well and made his discomfort clear to Cashman only after the 2018 trade deadline, when he told Cashman he was surprised he was not dealt away and never wanted to be a Yankee in the first place.

After that season, Cashman dealt Gray to the Reds, ending a 1 ¹/₂-year tenure in which Gray pitched to a 4.51 ERA and was hit particularly hard, by opponents and fans, at Yankee Stadium.

And so four teams and eight seasons later, Gray pondered why New York and the Yankees were such a terrible fit.

“I came from Oakland, and Oakland to here,” Gray said as part of a nearly three-minute reflection. “I think that maybe during my time [in New York] there was a lot of outside this, outside that, unfamiliarity with me and my situation and my family.

“It’s kind of like one of those things that you have a snowball or whatever, right? And there’s a snowball that kind of starts rolling down a hill. If you don’t ever stop it, then the snowball just gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and it picks up traction and it just gets more snow. And it just continues to go down this thing. And then the bigger the snowball gets, the harder it is to stop it or take a step back.”

The longer Gray stayed in New York, the worse it became.

He was showered with boos June 30, 2018, after lasting just 2 ¹/₃ innings and giving up seven runs to these same Red Sox. He was out of the rotation by August of that year.

“It just took me to get away and get myself into a different environment and then reflect on those things, right — reflect on what was good, what was bad, what didn’t work. And that took some time,” said the 36-year-old, who has been either good or great with five other franchises and was miserable with the Yankees. “But I do know that playing here made me a stronger person, made me a better man, a better husband. Ultimately, it made me a better pitcher, a better baseball player. And that’s kind of what I take from my time here.”

His time as a Yankee is over. His time as a Yankees rival will reach its culmination Wednesday.

What kind of reception is he expecting?

“I think it will be a playoff energy on the road, playoff atmosphere on the road,” Gray said. “As far as reception, this or that, it will be what it will be. I’m not going to sit here and try to control something that I can’t control because I ultimately have no control over that.

“It will be what it will be, and I’ll just do my part to be ready to go out there and compete and to pitch and to go win a game.”

SAN DIEGO — The crowd stood on its feet Tuesday night, watched the bullpen gate open in center field, and there he was, No. 44, strolling onto the field.

Joe Musgrove first started walking, and then as the scoreboard showed his face, began jogging to the mound. He stopped, tugged at his belt, pounded his right fist into his glove, and then skipped to the mound as his San Diego Padres teammates stood on the top step of the dugout cheering.

Everyone else in the sellout crowd of 47,084 at Petco Park was giving their homegrown hero a standing ovation, too.

The playoff game was long decided by the time Musgrove entered in the ninth inning, with the Padres routing the Chicago Cubs, 8-0, in their biggest postseason shutout in franchise history in Game 1 of their wild card series against the Chicago Cubs.

Now, even after Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado homered in the first inning, even with ace Michael King flirting with a no-hitter into the seventh inning, with the Padres out-hitting the Cubs, 13-3, this was the moment this fans had long awaited.

It had been two long years, Oct. 2, 2024, to be exact, when they last saw Musgrove step onto the mound.

Musgrove underwent Tommy John surgery after he walked off the mound in that 2024 postseason game against Atlanta, missed the entire 2025 season, and believed he’d be ready to start this season. Then, came the heartbreak. Setback after setback. He believed at times he could be back, and other times wondering if he’d ever even pitch again.

“I've been through a lot of a lot of headaches and a lot of negative thoughts over the last year and a half," Musgrove told a handful of reporters Tuesday night at his locker “You know, a lot of it's self-inflicted. I get into these ruts of just feeling like I'm letting people down, and I'm not holding up my end of the deal.

“But you know, the work and the effort I'm putting in is really all I can control."

Musgrove, who was told two days ago that he’d be on the playoff roster, began warming up in the eighth inning. His legs felt like jelly. He could feel his heart pounding against his chest. He hadn’t felt nerves like this since, well, maybe the night of Apri 9, 2021, when he threw the first no-hitter in Padres history.

“It was the most nervous I’ve been," Musgrove said, “pitching with an eight-run lead."

Now, coming in just to record the final three outs in mop-up relief, he felt as if he were on the mound trying to save a one-run game in Game 7 of the World Series, with the crowd on its feet screaming.

“I had been visualizing this and going through it in my head," Musgrove said. “So I expected it to get a little loud and people to be excited. But I didn’t expect quite that crazy of a mound."

When Musgrove stepped on the mound, he became only the second player in MLB history to appear in a postseason game directly after missing two entire regular seasons. The only other man to pull off the feat was catcher Clyde McCullough in the 1945 World Series, after missing the previous two seasons serving in World War II.

“I’ve been here before, you know, pitching in the playoffs and pitching a big game," Musgrove said. “So it was just the mental preparation, finding ways to calm down, kind of mentally putting myself in those situations, feeling how the emotions are going to be, and knowing where my mind tends to go in those moments."

NEW YORK — One decision, in either direction, right or wrong, could mean the game or the series for postseason teams. For the Boston Red Sox, it took all of three pitches to find out that a curious decision by manager Chad Tracy has them on the brink of elimination.

After the New York Yankees' 9-0 win in Game 1 of their AL wild-card series, Tracy was asked about his decision to pull starter Payton Tolle after 83 pitches. Tolle didn’t show signs of fatigue when he was replaced by left-hander Erik Miller and went to the visitors’ dugout, giving up five hits, one earned run, one walk, and four strikeouts.

Game 1 was Tracy’s first postseason game as a manager, and before the matchup between the heated AL East rivals, he said he was most excited for the players because of the adversity they had faced this season, earning a playoff spot despite being 14 games under .500 in late June. He took over on an interim basis in April after Alex Cora was fired and led the team to a 77-58 record the rest of the way.

“I thought he threw the ball well. They did an effective job of grinding the count up as well. He had traffic. They put traffic on him. He was able to navigate his way through that. I think he competed extremely well for the time that he was out there and gave us what he could,” Tracy said of Tolle.

"I think the number being up there in the mid-80s, still trying to get through five, probably higher than what you normally see with Payton, and to be expected in an environment like this. But I thought he competed his butt off."

No matter what your worst expectations were for this game, you probably didn’t expect this. Three Padres pitchers combined for a three-hit 8-0 shutout in Game 1 of the National League Wild Card Series.

Padres starter Michael King came out and absolutely dominated the Cubs. Whether he was amped up because of the situation or the Cubs were flat because of their ridiculous situation over the past week, it didn’t matter. It was probably both. The Cubs could do nothing against him and he made the lineup look like minor leaguers.

Meanwhile, the Padres got off to a fast start as leadoff hitter Fernando Tatis Jr. crushed a first-pitch changeup over the center field wall. Pete Crow-Armstrong got some leather on it, but not nearly enough. After Boyd retired Samad Taylor on a bunt attempt, he gave up a second solo home run to Manny Machado, this one into the left-field bleachers. Once again, it was on a changeup. At the end of one inning, it was 2-0 Padres.

Boyd recovered in the second inning and retired the side in order, but then he had to face Tatis and Machado again in the third. Boyd was much more careful with Tatis the second time, but he ended up walking him. After striking out Taylor for the second out of the inning, Machado lined a four-seamer that caught too much of the plate for an RBI double to make it 3-0 San Diego after three.

It might has well have been 10-0 Padres at that point the way King was pitching. Seiya Suzuki reached on an error in the second inning. King walked Crow-Armstrong after two outs in the third and PCA promptly stole second, but the Cubs couldn’t cash in either mistake. Suzuki walked in the fourth and Michael Busch walked in the sixth. But the Cubs were unable to get a hit off King until Nico Hoerner hit a hard grounder down the third base line that Machado couldn’t handle cleanly. It wouldn’t have mattered. Machado would not have thrown out the speedy Hoerner at first and the Cubs had their first and only hit. It was the top of the seventh inning.

By that point, things were out of hand anyways. Boyd gave up his third solo home run of the game in the fourth inning to Xander Bogaerts that banged off the Western Metal Supply Company building down the left field line. Once again, it was off a changeup, but this one was right down the heart of the plate.

Javier Assad came in to pitch the fifth inning and the Padres blew the game open with three more runs. Assad loaded bases with two outs after a leadoff single, a two-out walk and a single to left that the catcher couldn’t score from second base on. Then manager Craig Counsell went to the bullpen and called on Ryan Rolison. A two-run single and a passed ball by Carson Kelly meant that all three inherited runners scored and it was 7-0.

The Padres added another run in the seventh inning to make it 8-0 when Tatis reached on a slow roller of an infield single. He then stole second base and scored all the way from second when Kelly’s throw bounced into left field.

There was a big moment in the top of the ninth when Padres manager Craig Stammen called on Joe Musgrove out of the bullpen. Musgrove was a surprise addition to the roster as he hadn’t pitched since 2024. Musgrove struck out Busch with his first pitch and then gave up a single to Suzuki. Next he walked Happ and Hoerner loaded the bases with a single for the Cubs’ third hit. But Pedro Ramírez then popped out and pinch-hitter Michael Conforto struck out to end the game.

People overuse the phrase “must-win” game, but Wednesday’s Game 2 and hopefully Thursday’s Game 3 are “must-win.” The Cubs cannot repeat the lethargic performance they turned in tonight. The offense needs to get into gear and the pitchers need to hit their spots better. Teams that lost the first game of a Wild Card Series under this current format are 1-15. Now there is probably some small-sample size variation there and the Cubs chances are probably a bit better than 6 percent, but under no circumstances is it anything other than a long shot that the Cubs come back and win the next two games. But “long shot” does not mean impossible. So let’s do it.

SAN DIEGO — So much for those five regular-season wins.

So much for the 55 runs, the 23-3 humiliation in July and all the evidence the Chicago Cubs could carry into October suggesting they had the San Diego Padres’ number.

But numbers don’t mean everything, and not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted. So on Tuesday night, the Padres started their own count. 

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. 

San Diego opened the NL wild-card series with an emphatic 8-0 victory over Chicago at a roaring Petco Park, riding Michael King’s flirtation with history and first-inning thunder from Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado to move within one victory of returning the favor for last October’s elimination at Wrigley Field.

Everyone expected this to be a close battle between two of baseball’s best teams. Instead it was an ambush. 

King carried a no-hitter into the seventh inning against the highest-scoring offense in baseball, suffocating the Cubs for 6 1/3 innings before Nico Hoerner finally broke up the no-no with a soft grounder to third base that Machado couldn’t field and throw cleanly, allowing Hoerner to reach on an infield single. 

By then, the damage had been done everywhere else.

King struck out Pete Crow-Armstrong and Alex Bregman back-to-back in a perfect first inning. Moments later, Tatis sent Matthew Boyd’s first pitch of the night over the center-field wall.

Crow-Armstrong nearly brought it back, but nearly was about as close as Chicago got in this blowout.

Four pitches into Machado’s first plate appearance, the Padres third baseman launched another homer and Petco Park was shaking beneath 47,084 fans, including actor Bill Murray.

Chicago’s offense limped into October and apparently brought the limp through airport security.

Crow-Armstrong, the presumptive NL MVP, went 0-for-3 with three strikeouts, and King struck out Chicago’s top two hitters — PCA and Bregman — six times in their first seven combined at-bats.

Meanwhile, Boyd’s previous problems against San Diego followed him into the postseason.

Tatis walked in the third and Machado doubled him home for a 3-0 lead. Boyd departed after four innings, having allowed five hits and four runs.

After that, the Padres turned Game 1 into batting practice. 

Xander Bogaerts supplied the evening’s loudest souvenir in the fourth, launching a no-doubt homer into the second deck of the Western Metal Supply Co. building.

Then San Diego ripped the game open with three runs in the fifth.

Jackson Merrill punched a two-run single through the right side with the bases loaded before a wild pitch brought home another run.

By then, this stopped resembling the tense three-game chess match everyone anticipated and started looking like San Diego was settling an old score.

The Padres were baseball’s hottest team over the final month and a half of the season. Tuesday offered compelling evidence that momentum didn’t disappear when the calendar flipped to October.

By the time fans sang “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” the only drama left was whether Chicago could avoid the shutout.

They couldn’t.

San Diego native Joe Musgrove, who has not pitched on a major league mound since the 2024 NL wild-card series, made his triumphant return after two years and closed out the game.

What it means

The Padres needed to plant their flag immediately after Chicago took Game 1 at Wrigley last October.

Consider it planted.

San Diego is now one victory from advancing and turns to Nick Pivetta in Game 2 on Wednesday night. Even more importantly, the Padres never had to touch Adrián Morejón, Bradgley Rodriguez or Mason Miller.

Their three most dangerous bullpen weapons will be rested with Chicago’s season on the line.

Turning point

Tatis’ first-pitch home run.

King had just retired the Cubs in order when Tatis sent Boyd’s first offering toward the center-field wall.

The Cubs never recovered.

Did you see that?

Bogaerts didn’t simply homer in the fourth inning. He sent it to the moon.

His blast landed in the second deck of the Western Metal Supply Co. building, one of those home runs where the outfielder’s only responsibility is to turn around and admire the architecture.

Up next

The Padres can finish the job Wednesday night at Petco Park with Pivetta starting Game 2 at 7 p.m.

Chicago announced that Kevin Gausman, acquired from the Toronto Blue Jays at the trade deadline and dealing with an injured left shoulder, is starting in Game 2.

Guasman inherits a fairly simple assignment:

Save the Cubs’ season.

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4 Wild card games yesterday. In chronological order:

Braves 5, Phillies 3

• Chris Sale and Jesús Luzardo were both good. Luzardo’s bullpen let him down big time. Because his bullpen has been so bad this season, Phils manager Don Mattingly put Jhoan Duran out there for a 9-out save. He did not get 9 outs. Duran got Will Brennan’d by Austin Riley, who hit a 3-run homer off him in the middle of his second inning of work. There ended up not being a 9th inning for PHI to pitch, because they did nothing in the top of the 9th and lost.

White Sox 6, Astros 3

• I’m gonna be a bit dramatic here and say the Astros didn’t really respect their opponent heading into this game. The White Sox have many flaws, but their hitters are both pesky and good. Houston apparently thought they could pepper them with garbage relief arms and succeed. This bullpen game strategy did not work one bit for Houston, who probably should have given up 13 runs. CWS could not really hit with RISP which kept this one way closer than it should have been.

Yankees 9, Red Sox 0

• Payton Tolle pitched well. The Boston bullpen behind him got shelled. We expected the Sox bullpen to stink this week—we thought those socks would be White.

Padres 8, Cubs 0

• The Cubs have baseball’s best offense and worst pitching. Only the latter individuals showed up Tuesday night. The Padres looked awesome in this game. Michael King was so good that they only needed to score 1 run, which they had 1 batter into the game. King allowed just 1 hit, an infield ground ball to Manny Machado whose attempt at making a spectacular play… didn’t happen.

And now something fun:

Perhaps the main reason the Yankees survived so much missed time by Aaron Judge this year was their starting rotation.

For all of its success, though, there was no guarantee that their main arms would be available — at the same time — until recently.

It has only been the past month in which Tuesday’s Game 1 starter in the wild-card series against Boston, Cam Schlittler, Game 2 starter Max Fried and potential Game 3 starter Gerrit Cole, along with Carlos Rodón, have been able to take all their starts consistently.

“It’s something that I was looking forward to when I first signed here,’’ Fried said Tuesday before the Yankees’ 9-0 win of joining Cole and Rodón in the team’s rotation. “It took a little bit longer than anyone probably would have expected. But also we were able to add another really, really quality arm in Cam. He’s obviously been doing great things.”

Even with Cole and Rodón out of the rotation as they recovered from elbow surgeries they underwent in 2025, and Fried hitting the injured list twice with a bone bruise in his left elbow, the Yankees still put up the best ERA among starters in the majors (3.30).

But since all got healthy, the rotation put up an ERA of 3.09, with some help from Will Warren.

If the Yankees advance to the ALDS to face the Rays — and beyond — Rodón will no doubt return to the rotation, which would give the Yankees a chance against anyone.

“It starts with starting pitching keeping you in the game,’’ Fried said. “We take a lot of pride in being able to put our best foot forward, and we have a lot of confidence in all those guys that are going to be able to take the ball.”

The task of the rotation will be tougher with Judge out for at least the wild-card series with a strained calf and with Giancarlo Stanton limited to pinch hitting after missing almost the entire season with calf injuries of his own.

“Gerrit coming back from surgery, that was a big boost,’’ Fried said of Cole’s return in May from Tommy John surgery. “I know how important it was for me and Carlos to try to make as many starts and to be healthy throughout the whole year like we did last year. And we definitely were frustrated by the fact that we had to go on the IL a couple of times. But this was the goal. The goal was to make sure that we were in a good, built-up position and healthy going into September into the playoffs.”

And that’s where they are, although they were unable to catch the Rays to avoid the wild-card series.

Fried has been a significant part of it.

In his final eight starts of the regular season, Fried had a 2.09 ERA over 43 innings.

He is showing no effects of the bone bruise in the elbow that was diagnosed in May and sidelined him for over two months — and then sent him back to the IL for two weeks in August.

“I would say that the command has gotten a lot better,’’ Fried said of his performance since his return. “I think just the pitching, to the not pitching, to getting back into it again, [made me] a little bit rusty. But over my last couple [starts], I felt normal. I feel like the same me. I’m not really worrying about my health going into the start.”

Tuesday's Game 1 of the Wild Card Series between the Yankees and Red Sox went as expected.

Both starters, Cam Schlittler and Payton Tolle, lived up to their hype, allowing just one run between them through the first four innings. However, things shifted in the fifth. 

After Tolle got the first two outs on eight pitches, Red Sox manager Chad Tracy came out to pull his talented young left-hander after 83 pitches. The 23-year-old wasn't as dominant as he had been for most of this season. The Red Sox skipper said the Yankees did a good job of making Tolle work and had a lot of traffic on the bases, which the southpaw navigated out of with minimal damage, but there were a few factors in Tracy's decision. 

"He competed extremely well for the time he was out there," Tracy said. "He gave us what he could. The number being up in the mid-80s, still trying to get through five [innings], probably higher than what you normally see from Payton, and to be expected in an environment like this, but I thought he competed his butt off."

Tracy decided to use left-hander Erik Miller to face Ben Rice and finish the fifth. Rice came into the at-bat with a double in the first inning before Tolle struck him out swinging in the third. However, Rice smashed a 97 mph sinker over the heart of the plate that traveled 423 feet to straightaway center field for his first home run of the night, and put the Yankees up 2-0. 

BEN RICE. 2-0! pic.twitter.com/PgXWZtTKcI

— SNY Yankees (@snyyankees) September 30, 2026

The move and the immediate aftermath led to questions about Tracy's decision. And he elaborated on his thought process and chalked it up to Rice getting one off of Miller.

"Not necessarily just the pitch count," Tracy said. "You’re trailing already. You’re moving third time through the order. Rice had already hit a double in the gap off of him. And you have a nice lane there for Miller and obviously, he got him. Felt like it was time to go."

"As a competitor, as a starting pitcher in this league, you want to go as long as you can every time," Tolle said after the game. "But with what our bullpen has done all year, I believe they are going to make the right decision. I want to go as long as I can, but I understand those guys picked me up a lot this year."

Despite the Rice homer, Boston was only down two runs with plenty of time to make a comeback. But it was a jolt that the Yankees needed at the moment.

"That was electric. That insurance run, that was huge for us. A little bit of breathing room," Spencer Jones said after the game. "He smoked that ball. We were super fired up about it."

That electricity was taken out on the Boston bullpen, which couldn't keep the score close. The Red Sox wound up using five relievers, who allowed eight runs, including a grand slam to Rice that put the game away in the eighth. 

With the loss, the Red Sox face elimination in Game 2 on Wednesday night. The team has faced adversity all season long to get to this point, but they understand the challenge they face.

"That’s why Tolle was out there; that’s why Schlittler was out there. Trying really hard to get Game 1 and now you have to win two in a row," Tracy said. "You have to be aggressive and try to win as many moments as we can. Because now we have to win two in a row to keep our season alive." 

"I haven’t heard the fat lady sing yet," Tolle said. "We’re going to keep going out there. I believe in us. It’s going to be fun to watch these guys compete tomorrow."

Former Yankee Sonny Gray will take the mound for Boston, looking to force a deciding Game 3. 

Superstar captain Aaron Judge was absent from both the Yankees lineup and the pregame player-by-player introductions due to a calf injury, which kept him off the team's Wild Card roster. 

Slugging DH Giancarlo Stanton and CF Trent Grisham were available off the bench to pinch-hit, but both remain somewhat sidelined by injuries of their own.

With lefty hurler Payton Tolle starting for the Red Sox, two everyday lefty batters (Luis Garcia Jr. and Ryan McMahon) were benched in favor of righty platoon options (Heliot Ramos and Amed Rosario).

Ramos, Rosario, and the three lefty pinch hitters, who were eventually subbed in (Grisham, Garcia Jr., and McMahon), batted a combined 0-for-7 on the night.

None of it mattered.

The Yankees offense knocked Tolle out of the game in the fifth inning, then proceeded to bludgeon Boston's bullpen and cruised to a commanding 9-0 win to take Game 1 of their best-of-three Wild Card series.

Ben Rice will steal the headlines with his two home runs - including a late grand slam to put the game well out of reach - and six RBI. However, multi-hit nights from George Lombard Jr. and Austin Wells in the bottom half of the Yankees batting order deserve plenty of plaudits as well.

Lombard made his playoff debut in front of a frenetic crowd in the Bronx, and delivered with a terrific 3-for-4 night at the plate, coming around to score two runs.

"It's really cool," the 21-year-old said following his first taste of postseason baseball. "It's definitely an honor and I have to pinch myself every now and then, but we know what the goal is and we know what we're all trying to do as a group."

Wells, meanwhile, drove in two runs with a single and a sacrifice fly, finishing his night having gone 2-for-3, plus a walk for good measure.

"The runs added up there at the end, but I think the guys did a great job of extending the lineup," said the catcher postgame. "Great at-bats up and down [the lineup], waiting for great pitches, being stubborn in the box, getting into some of their bullpen guys."

Wells, of course, struggled mightily during the regular season with a career-worst .624 OPS, but has looked much more poised at the plate lately.

With both Stanton and Judge missing from the Yankees lineup in 2026, the team was just 52-43.

In those games, the Bronx Bombers hit for a .690 OPS and tallied a shade over 4.2 runs scored per game. For reference, across the 2026 regular season, MLB teams averaged a .718 OPS and 4.48 runs scored per game.

 If Wells can tap into his form from years prior this fall, and if Lombard's unflappable plate approach carries onward, they could be real X-factors to ignite a Yankees offense, which had been searching for answers without their big boppers in the lineup.

"We'll have a chance to close it out [in Game 2], but it's one win," concluded manager Aaron Boone. "We got the blinders on, but it's a confident group."

"If we can play our game, we can beat anyone."

BEN RICE BRINGS THE HAMMER DOWN!

A grand slam and the Yankees lead 9-0! pic.twitter.com/42w0x95BAD

— SNY Yankees (@snyyankees) September 30, 2026