2020 American League Division Series 1

2020 American League Division Series

Tampa Bay Rays 40 - 20 in the AL	3 - 2 Series Summary	New York Yankees 33 - 27 in the AL

Overview[edit]

The Teams[edit]

Managers: Yankees: Aaron Boone | Rays: Kevin Cash

Yankees

Rays

Umpires[edit]

David Rackley, C.B. Bucknor, Mark Carlson (crew chief), Todd Tichenor, Marvin Hudson, Mike Estabrook

Series results[edit]

Game	Score	Date	Starters	Time (ET)
1	New York Yankees 9 Tampa Bay Rays 3	October 5	Gerrit Cole (1-0) Blake Snell (0-1)	8:00 pm
2	New York Yankees 5 Tampa Bay Rays 7	October 6	Deivi Garcia (0-0) Tyler Glasnow (1-0)	8:00 pm
3	Tampa Bay Rays 8 New York Yankees 4	October 7	Charlie Morton (1-0) Masahiro Tanaka (0-1)	7:00 pm
4	Tampa Bay Rays 1 New York Yankees 5	October 8	Ryan Thompson (0-1) Jordan Montgomery (0-0)	7:00 pm
5	New York Yankees 1 Tampa Bay Rays 2	October 9	Gerrit Cole (1-0) Tyler Glasnow (1-0)	7:00 pm

Results[edit]

Game 1 @ Petco Park[edit]

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Yankees	1	0	1	0	2	0	0	0	5	9	15	0
Rays	1	0	0	2	0	0	0	0	0	3	6	0
WP: Gerrit Cole (1-0); LP: Blake Snell (0-1)
Home Runs: TB - Randy Arozarena (1), Ji-Man Choi (1); NYY - Clint Frazier (1), Kyle Higashioka (1), Aaron Judge (1), Giancarlo Stanton (1)

Attendance: none

The Yankees win Game 1 behind Gerrit Cole and a barrage of homers, in a game that was close until a five-run 9th inning put it away. With four homers today, the Yankees set a new record with 11 homers in their three postseason games this year - the most by any team in a three-game stretch in the history of postseason baseball. Facing Cole on the mound for the Rays was Blake Snell, who had a shaky outing and was probably left in too long by Kevin Cash.

Both teams scored in the 1st inning, first the Yankees who were considered the visiting team, as D.J. LeMahieu led off the game with a single on a full count, then took second base on a wild pitch. This proved to be crucial, as Snell retired the next three batters, but a ground ball by Aaron Judge and a fly ball by Aaron Hicks allowed LeMahieu to score, with Hicks receiving credit for a sacrifice fly. In the bottom of the inning, however, Randy Arozarena blasted a homer to center field with two outs to tie the score. There was no scoring in the 2nd, but in the 3rd, Snell hung a breaking ball against Clint Frazier, who propelled it into the balcony deep in left field for a solo homer. In the 4th, the Yankees threatened to do some significant damage as Hicks led off with a single, Giancarlo Stanton walked with one out, and after a ground out just in front of home plate by Giovanny Urshela, Gleyber Torres drew a walk as well to load the bases. Snell was visibly struggling with his command and had not been sharp from the start, but he reached back to strike out Frazier on a full count, escaping without giving up a run. The Rays then stunned Cole in the bottom of the inning when Arozarena singled and Ji-Man Choi, who had unbelievable career stats against the Yankees' ace, crushed one of his pitches into center field for a two-run homer, giving Tampa a 3-2 lead.

In spite of his very difficult 4th inning, Snell returned to pitch the 5th for the Rays, but this time he couldn't pull off a Harry Houdini impersonation. Kyle Higashioka, starting in place of Gary Sanchez as Cole's personal catcher, led off the inning with a homer, and after one out, Judge took him deep as well to give the Yankees back the lead. They would never relinquish it. After a second out, Luke Voit hit another ball very hard, but this one hit off the right-field wall for a double, and on another full count Snell managed to strike out the dangerous Stanton to strand Voit. Cole also struggled in the bottom of the inning, as after two outs he walked Brandon Lowe and gave up a single to Arozarena, giving the youngster back-to-back three-hit games. Next up was Choi, Cole's personal nemesis. His first two pitches were well out of the strike zone, and then after a conference on the mound, Cole elected to issue Choi an intentional walk, loading the bases, to face Manuel Margot. Margot struck out swinging and the score remained 4-3 in New York's favor.

The next few innings did not feature any runs, as Tampa brought out some of its excellent relievers, starting with Ryan Thompson in the 6th. He pitched a couple of scoreless innings, thanks to a double play in each, as Tampa's pitchers had fallen into the nasty habit of always allowing the lead-off hitter of an inning to reach base (it happened seven times in their nine turns at bat). Cole completed his night's work with a perfect bottom of the 6th, striking out the last two men he faced to give him 8 Ks. Chad Green pitched the 7th, giving up just a two-out walk, while Oliver Drake did the work for Tampa in the 8th. In the bottom of the 8th, Yankees set-up man Zack Britton performed his assigned task, but in the 9th, John Curtiss, coming off an outstanding year for the Rays, simply did not have it in this game. He gave up a lead-off single to Higashioka, walked LeMahieu on four pitches, and after striking out Judge looking, gave up a single to Hicks that allowed the Yankees to score an important insurance run. There was no one warming up in the Rays' bullpen, however, so Curtiss got to walk Tyler Wade, who had come in as a defensive replacement the previous inning, loading the bases, and then Stanton did what he does best, crushing a pitch out of leaping CF Kevin Kiermaier's reach for a grand slam. The score was now 9-3, and the game was over for all practical purposes. With all that there was just one out, and Curtiss could not complete the inning; he gave up another hit, a single to Gleyber Torres with two outs, and gave way to Shane McClanahan, a youngster making his major league debut. He also struggled, allowing Torres to steal second (who knows for what purpose, given the score, but there was a lot of bad blood between these two teams), gave up a single to Brett Gardner and walked Higashioka to load the bases again before he finally ended the nightmare when LeMahieu, the 11th batter of the inning, grounded back to him. Aroldis Chapman had been warming up for the Yankees before the floodgates opened, but with a huge lead it was Luis Cessa who was tasked with getting the last three outs, which he did while issuing a harmless two-out walk to Yandy Diaz.

Game 2 @ Petco Park[edit]

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Yankees	0	1	0	3	0	0	0	0	1	5	5	1
Rays	1	2	2	0	1	1	0	0	x	7	8	0
WP: Tyler Glasnow (1-0); LP: J.A. Happ (0-1); SV: Pete Fairbanks (1)
Home Runs: NYY - Giancarlo Stanton 2 (3); TB - Randy Arozarena (2), Mike Zunino (1); Manuel Margot (1), Austin Meadows (1)

Attendance: none

The Yankees tried to play cute in Game 2, pretending they were sending Deivi Garcia to pitch the game, and then quickly pulling him to have lefty veteran J.A. Happ face a lefthander-heavy Rays line-up. It was clearly not a stunt that such a strong hitting team required, and it backfired as Happ had a poor outing, while Garcia, even if he was the youngest pitcher to start in the Yankees' long and illustrious postseason history, could very well have given the Rays' hitters a run for their money. As it was, the Rays won this game by scoring at least one run in five of the first six innings, and even a prodigious feat of power-hitting by Giancarlo Stanton could not overcome that. Worse, the outcome ensured that there would be a Game 4, and by pulling this stunt, the Yankees had seriously weakened their options for a crucial meeting down the road.

The Rays had put up the best record in the American League in part by adapting their line-up to the opposing starting pitcher, keeping a number of players who could play different positions on the bench, and being able to put out a very right-handed or left-handed line-up according to the circumstances of a particular game - they had even gone so far as to start the first entirely left-handed line-up in major league history in a September game against the Boston Red Sox. The Yankees were hoping to counter this by starting young righty Garcia, and after one inning of work, moving to the lefty Happ. It did not work as intended. The top of the 1st inning went as expected against the hard-throwing Tyler Glasnow, as he struck out two men but also gave up a walk, as he did not have full control of pitches, but when they were in the strike zone, they were pretty much unhittable. In the bottom of the inning, the first two batters for Tampa hit fly balls, but the exceedingly hot Randy Arozarena then took Garcia deep for a 1-0 lead. And then, Happ began to warm up in the Yankees' bullpen and it was clear something was up, as just surrendering a homer should not have been enough to consider removing Garcia, who may have been inexperienced, but who had good stuff and poise well beyond his years. He hit Ji-Man Choi with a pitch, but then got out of the inning by forcing a ground out from Manuel Margot.

The Rays' pitchers would strike out a record 18 batters in this game, and Glasnow collected two more in the top of the 2nd, on his way to striking out 10, but not before he had given up a lead-off homer to Stanton, who was as hot as any hitter not named Arozarena. Happ came in to pitch the 2nd, but whatever match-up advantage the Yankees were hoping to gain never materialized. Joey Wendle greeted him with a single and after two outs, C Mike Zunino drove a ball out of the park for a two-run homer and a 3-1 lead. The Yankees went down in order in the 3rd, then it was Margot who hit a two-run homer in the bottom of the inning, with Choi on base courtesy of walk, making it 5-1. The Rays threatened to blow the game open at that point as Wendle followed with a single and Willy Adames hit a tapper in front of home; Happ fielded it barehanded, but then threw the ball into right field and runners were on second and third with just one out. However, Kevin Kiermaier popped out for the second out and Happ struck out Zunino to prevent further damage. The Yankees then came back in the 4th. Aaron Hicks singled and Luke Voit drew a walk, bringing up Stanton. He absolutely murdered one of Glasnow's pitches, sending it to the upper deck in left field, at a distance officially measured at 458 feet, although it looked to most observers like it was easily 500 feet. That was worth three runs, and the score was now 5-4 in favor of Tampa, with nobody out. The Yankees were officially back in the game. However, this did not shake Glasnow who proceeded to strike out the next three batters in order. The Rays failed to score for the first time in the bottom of the inning, but they still came close as Arozarena singled again with two outs, reached second on a wild pitch by Happ who walked Choi. Happ gave way to Adam Ottavino, who managed to get pinch-hitter Yoshi Tsutsugo to fly out to end the inning, but the ball made it to the warning track in left.

Glasnow was still dealing in the 5th. After Gary Sanchez grounded out, he got both D.J. LeMahieu and Aaron Judge to strike out swinging. In the bottom of the inning, Wendle walked and stole second, then after Adames grounded out, manager Aaron Boone brought in Jonathan Loaisiga to replace Ottavino, but he allowed a single to Kiermaier to tally run number 6. Zunino then lined a ball to LeMahieu, and since Kiemaier was running on the pitch, he was doubled off easily to end the inning. In the top of the 6th, Glasnow walked the lead-off man, Hicks, and gave way to Diego Castillo. His first six pitches resulted in two strikeouts, after which Giovanny Urshela lined out to left. Austin Meadows then hit Tampa's fourth homer of the evening, and it was 7-4. The Yankees got the first two men aboard against Castillo in the 7th. He was replaced by Nick Anderson and guess what? He struck out the side, needing just 11 pitches, and then retired the side in order in the 8th. Meanwhile, the Yankees got nice innings from two of the men lower down their bullpen totem pole, Jonathan Holder and Nick Nelson, to keep within three runs of the Rays, so they still had a chance when Pete Fairbanks came out to pitch the 9th. He started on the wrong foot with back-to-back walks to Urshela and Gleyber Torres, but Fairbanks then struck out Clint Frazier and Sanchez to bring the night's total to 18. LeMahieu singled to center to drive in a run, but Fairbanks then ended the game by getting Judge to ground out to third. The series was tied at one win apiece.

Game 3 @ Petco Park[edit]

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Rays	0	1	0	3	1	3	0	0	0	8	13	2
Yankees	0	0	1	0	1	0	0	2	0	4	7	0
WP: Charlie Morton (1-0); LP: Masahiro Tanaka (0-0)
Home Runs: TB - Kevin Kiermaier (1), Randy Arozarena (3), Michael Perez (1); NY - Giancarlo Stanton (4)

Attendance: none

The Rays won Game 3 by doing exactly what they had done in Game 2: pound the ball all over the park and beyond, and contain the Yankees' bats - once again with the exception of Giancarlo Stanton, seemingly bent on rewriting the Yankees' postseason record book. They got a solid start from Charlie Morton, who gave up two runs in five innings, and by the time it was time to call on the bullpen, they had built a large enough lead against Masahiro Tanaka and the first few relievers Aaron Boone sent in that they could use some of their lesser relievers for the next three innings, until Diego Castillo nailed down the win. Stanton's homer, his fourth of the series marking the fifth straight game in which he had gone deep this postseason, came with an 8-2 Rays lead in the 8th inning against Shane McClanahan, who had never pitched in a major league game before Game 1, so the impact of the two-run shot was limited.

The 1st inning was scoreless, its first highlight being another hit by the red hot Randy Arozarena, who Tyler Glasnow had called "the best hitter in baseball at this moment" in a post-game interview the night before, a bold statement that the Cuban youngster would live up to. He was stranded this time, thanks to a magnificent catch by RF Aaron Judge, who used all of his 6' 7" frame to snag a hard-hit line drive by Ji-Man Choi in the right field corner, but there would not be another scoreless inning until the 7th. In the 2nd, Joey Wendle and Willie Adames singled, then with two outs C Michael Perez, in for Mike Zunino, hit a ball just off the tip of the glove of leaping 6' 4" 2B D.J. LeMahieu and into right field to drive in a first run. Arozarena singled again in the 3rd but was again stranded, and in the bottom of the inning, the Yankees tied the score when Brett Gardner singled, reached second on an error by SS Willie Adames, took third on LeMahieu's walk, and came home on a sacrifice fly by Judge. Morton then walked Aaron Hicks to load the bases again, but he got Luke Voit to ground out to short to escape with minimum damage.

The Rays had their first big inning in the 4th, scoring three runs before making an out as Wendle singled, Adames walked, and Kevin Kiermaier homered to right field. In the 5th, the unstoppable Arozarena made it 5-1 as he hit a leadoff homer off Tanaka, who bid everyone adieu at this point, giving way to Chad Green after a disappointing performance. Green gave up a single to Choi, but otherwise escaped further damage. The Yankees then managed to claw back one run in the bottom of the inning, on a single by LeMahieu and a double by Hicks, making it 5-2 for Tampa. The Rays then had their second big inning in the 6th, and it put the game away. It started when Kiermaier hit a lead-off double and, after showing bunt on the first two pitches, Perez hit the Rays' third homer of the night on a line drive to left center. Luis Cessa replaced Green, but after two outs, he deliberately pitched around Arozarena, walking him, only to see the almost equally hot Choi line a solid double to the right field corner, with Arozarena circling the bases at full steam to make it 8-2. With a comfortable lead, Rays manager Kevin Cash turned to John Curtiss, who had been beaten like a rag doll in Game 1, giving him a chance to find some redemption, and he seemed completely unaffected by his poor performance two nights earlier as he retired the Yankees in order after a lead-off single by Stanton. He continued on in the 7th, getting two more outs before allowing a single to Judge, at which point McClanahan came out as Cash did not feel the need to expend some of his higher leverage arms. McClanahan got Hicks to fly out for the third out.

The Yankees were also using some of their lesser arms by that point, as both Nick Nelson and Michael King pitched a scoreless inning. In the bottom of the 8th, Adames committed his second error of the game, throwing wildly to first after fielding a routine grounder off the bat of Voit, and Stanton followed by parking a ball into the empty expanse behind the center field fence, well beyond Kiermaier's reach. The lead was down to 8-4, but Cash left the young McClanahan on the mound. Seemingly unaffected by what had just transpired, he rewarded his manager's confidence by retiring the next three batters, the last two by strikeout with some rather impressive stuff. King pitched another scoreless inning for New York in the top of the 9th while Castillo came out for the bottom of the inning and made quick work of the Yankees, sealing the win.

Game 4 @ Petco Park[edit]

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Rays	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	3	1
Yankees	0	2	0	0	0	2	0	1	x	5	11	0
WP: Chad Green (1-0); LP: Ryan Thompson (0-1); SV: Aroldis Chapman (1)
Home Runs: NY - Luke Voit (1), Gleyber Torres (1)

Attendance: none

The Yankees played pretty much a flawless game to win Game 4 by a 5-1 score. Playing their fourth game in four days, both teams had to dig deep to find a starting pitcher, with the Yankees turning to Jordan Montgomery, although with the clear understanding that he would be out at the first sign of serious trouble, while the Rays, if not the inventors at least the main proponents of the bullpen game, turned to that strategy with short reliever Ryan Thompson being given the ball as the opener.

Both teams started the 1st inning with a single, but for Tampa, Brandon Lowe, continuing his postseason-long struggles, grounded into a double play, while D.J. LeMahieu was left stranded when Thompson retired the next three batters. Montgomery pitched another strong inning in the 2nd, but Thompson served up a gopher ball to Luke Voit, who had led the major leagues in homers during the regular season, but had been one of the few regulars on the Yankees not to have homered yet in the postseason. After that mistake, Thompson lost the plate and walked Brett Gardner, Gleyber Torres and Gio Urshela in succession. He was left in to face Kyle Higashioka - who had now taken over the regular catching job from the underperforming Gary Sanchez - and struck him out, but LeMahieu hit a sacrifice fly to make the score 2-0. Kevin Cash replaced Thompson with Ryan Yarbrough at that point, and he got Aaron Judge to ground out. The Rays were lucky to have escaped with only limited damage. In the top of the 3rd, the Rays replied as Willie Adames led off with a walk, Kevin Kiermaier followed with an automatic double. Montgomery struck out Mike Zunino for the first out, but he then walked Yandy Diaz to load the bases. But Lowe hit into a force out, which allowed Adames to score, but broke the Rays' momentum, and Randy Arozarena, now back to being a mere mortal, grounded out to third to end the inning.

That inning was really the last serious threat for Tampa Bay that evening. The Yankees' pitchers were outstanding from that point on, with Montgomery giving them another scoreless inning in the 4th, and then the bullpen taking over with some shutdown work. Chad Green pitched two perfect innings, Zack Britton got five outs, all of them consecutively, while striking out three batters, and Aroldis Chapman closed it out with 1 1/3 innings, with a walk his only blemish. With no one getting on base, even trailing just 2-1 for most of that span, the Rays were unable to mount any sort of comeback, and the Yankees would give themselves a cushion in the late innings. In the 6th, Gardner singled with one out against Yarbrough and Torres followed with a long homer to left that hit the façade of the Western Metal Building integrated into Petco Park's architecture. That 4-1 lead was already a comfortable one, and in the 8th, they put one more run on the board, with Torres hitting a single and then stealing second, with Higashioka hitting a single to drive him in against Aaron Slegers. Slegers was on the mound as Cash decided to keep his best pitchers for the decisive game that would be played the next day, whereas Aaron Boone did not have that luxury, and had to use his best three relievers for more than an inning each to ensure there was indeed a decisive game to be played.

Game 5 @ Petco Park[edit]

Team	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Yankees	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	1	3	2
Rays	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	x	2	3	0
WP: Diego Castillo (1-0); LP: Aroldis Chapman (0-1)
Home Runs: NY - Aaron Judge (2); TB - Austin Meadows (2), Mike Brosseau (1)

Attendance: none

The Rays defeated the Yankees, 2-1, in Game 5 in a low-hitting game in which all the runs came courtesy of solo homers. The strategy for this game was set the previous night, as Kevin Cash had deliberately not used some of his top pitchers in order to have them ready to go two innings in this one. His starter, Tyler Glasnow, was working on very short rest, having started Game 2 just three days earlier, so it was clear he would not be asked to pitch deep into this one, but the Rays had a plan for the remainder of the game. For the Yankees, Gerrit Cole was also going on shorter rest than usual, but the plan was that he go as long as possible, hopefully six full innings. When, the night before, Aaron Boone had said that Cole was not available for a Game 5, no one had believed him, as his ace had been signed to a huge contract precisely to handle such assignments. Cole gave his manager everything he could possibly have asked for, but the problem was always how he would get the remaining outs, given his top three relievers had been used for longer than usual stretches the night before.

In the 1st inning Rays first baseman Ji-Man Choi showed his nimbleness, making great stops to snag off-target throws from Glasnow and SS Willie Adames, resulting in a quick 1-2-3 inning. In contrast, Cole had to labor hard, as he walked Brandon Lowe, hit Randy Arozarena with a pitch, and then with two outs walked Yandy Diaz as well to load the bases. He finally struck out Joey Wendle after a long battle and escaped with the game still scoreless, but he had needed 25 pitches to do so. However, the next frames went much better for him, so that pitch count was not really a big issue. He struck out the side in the 2nd to show that he was in top form. In the 3rd, after completing a turn through the batting order by striking out Kyle Higashioka, Glasnow gave way to Nick Anderson, who ended the inning by getting D.J. LeMahieu to ground into a double play, erasing Brett Gardner, who had reached on a walk, in the process. Cash's game plan was proceeding perfectly. But in the 4th, Aaron Judge led off the inning with an opposite field homer against Anderson and the Yankees had a 1-0 lead. The Rays thought they had their first hit of the night with one out of the 4th, when Diaz hit a ball at the edge of SS Gleyber Torres' range, which he bobbled, not making a throw. The initial ruling of hit was changed to error a short while later, maybe because the official scorer did not want this to be the only safety given up by Cole. In any case, Diaz was stranded as Cole was just dominating the Rays' batters at this point.

Anderson completed his stint on the mound with a scoreless 5th, giving up just a single in his 2 2/3 innings in addition to Judge's homer, and with two outs in the bottom of the inning, the Rays finally got a hit - an indisputable one this time - when Austin Meadows hit a ball beyond the fence in right-center. Judge went to the wall and jumped to try to snag the ball, but he had not taken into account the small lip jutting over the fence above the warning track and banged his head on it, coming tumbling down to the ground instead of soaring high to catch the homer. Judge wasn't hurt, but the game was tied. Pete Fairbanks came in to pitch in the top of the 6th and he gave up a two-out single to Aaron Hicks - which would turn out to be the Yankees' last hit of the season - and a walk to Giancarlo Stanton, but he then struck out Luke Voit to end the inning. In the bottom of the inning, the Rays' first batter was Arozarena who hit a ball a mile high to deep left against Cole. He was convinced it was gone and stopped to admire it, but Gardner managed to time his jump perfectly and do what Judge hadn't been able to do, pull the ball back from being a homer. That was Cole's last batter; he had made 94 pitches in a truly valiant effort, but the bullpen would need to do the rest now.

Zack Britton was the first reliever summoned by Boone and he gave up a single to the first batter he faced, Mike Brosseau, pinch-hitting for Choi. Brosseau's unenviable job description in this series was to face the Yankees' toughest lefties, and he was up to the task. However, after Diaz drew a walk, his third time reaching base, Britton struck out Joey Wendle and got Adames to line out to shortstop, keeping the game tied at 1. Fairbanks got the Yankees in order in the top of the 7th, but in the bottom of the inning, Giovanny Urshela, who had put on a defensive clinic at third base since the start of the postseason, committed a rare error on a routine grounder by Mike Zunino. After a second out, Boone replaced Britton with Aroldis Chapman, and Cash called on Brett Phillips to run for Zunino. But Chapman struck out Lowe to end that inning. Diego Castillo came out to pitch the 8th for Tampa, as the pitcher usage plan was working perfectly, and he was no easier customer than his predecessors, giving up a two-out walk to Judge but nothing else. Then came the fateful bottom of the 8th. After one out, Chapman settled down to face Brosseau and the ensuing at-bat was nothing short of epic, especially in the knowledge that in a game on September 1st, Chapman had thrown a 100+ mph fastball at Brosseau's head, barely missing him and prompting a huge on-field mêlée, and eventually a three-game suspension for Chapman. The pitcher got two quick strikes, but Brosseau then made him work hard, taking the next two pitches to even the count, and then fouling off a couple before Chapman missed with a fastball for ball three. On Pitch number 8, Brosseau hit a spectacular foul ball, that went clear out of Petco Park down the third base line as he was a bit ahead of a hanging breaking ball. He fouled off pitch number 9 as well, and then got all of another fastball on the tenth pitch, driving it to left field. Gardner went to the fence hoping to negate another homer, but this one was a few rows deep, beyond his reach, and landed for a homer. The Rays had their first lead of the game, 2-1, and the Yankees were down to their last three outs.

Castillo could have been overwhelmed by the pressure, but if it was the case, he did not show it in any way. With starters Blake Snell and Charlie Morton warming up in the Rays' bullpen in case things went sour, he struck out Stanton looking, and then Voit swinging. Urshela was the Yankees' last hope. He smoked a ball down the third base line, one of the hardest-hit all game, but Wendle caught the line drive as its force almost tore off the webbing of his glove. The game, an instant classic, was over. The Rays were moving on, having shown the baseball world that their best record in the American League in this bizarre season was no fluke.