Rays Finish the Sweep: Tampa Bay Tops Yankees 4-3 in ALDS Game 3 to Reach First ALCS Since 2020

NEW YORK — The end came the way everything had come in this series for the Yankees: close, agonizing, and with the smallest possible margin between a season extended and a season over. The Tampa Bay Rays held off a ninth-inning push to beat New York 4-3 on Wednesday night at a sold-out Yankee Stadium, completing a three-game ALDS sweep and advancing to the American League Championship Series for the first time since 2020.

The Rays, who had the best record in the American League this season, will host the winner of the White Sox–Guardians series in a best-of-seven ALCS that begins Monday. They celebrated on the Yankee Stadium grass for the second time this season, having clinched the AL East title there with a 6-1 win on Sept. 22. This time, the party came at the Yankees’ expense — and it made history: New York had never before been swept in a division series.

The difference on Wednesday was a rookie who did not look like one. With two outs in the sixth inning and the game tied 2-2, Junior Caminero lined a single over the head of Yankees starter Max Fried and past a diving Anthony Volpe. On the very next pitch, Victor Mesa Jr. crushed a 77-mph sweeper 401 feet into the right-center-field bleachers for his first career postseason home run. The blast ended Fried’s night after 80 pitches — the left-hander was charged with four earned runs on seven hits with seven strikeouts — and it was the first postseason homer Fried had allowed to a left-handed batter since Game 6 of the 2020 NLCS, when he pitched for the Atlanta Braves.

Mesa’s swing had company. Jonathan Aranda’s RBI single in the third scored Jonny DeLuca to give Tampa Bay an early lead, and Ryan Vilade tagged a 95-mph Fried fastball that barely cleared the right-field fence in the fourth. The Yankees answered both times — Ben Rice’s RBI single in the third, Spencer Jones’ RBI double in the fourth after Volpe’s infield single knocked Rays starter Nick Martinez out of the game — but never took the lead. Not in the inning, not in the game, not in the series. The Yankees never led the Rays at any point across three games.

Martinez allowed two runs on five hits in 3 2/3 innings before Volpe’s comebacker struck him on the lower back and ended his night. Ian Seymour followed with 1 1/3 scoreless innings for the win, Griffin Jax bridged two frames, and the bullpen carried it from there. Cam Booser got the first two outs of the eighth before Kevin Kelly struck out pinch hitter Giancarlo Stanton, and closer Bryan Baker worked the ninth for his third save of the series: a seven-pitch strikeout of Volpe, a four-pitch walk to Spencer Jones, a force-out grounder from Jazz Chisholm Jr., and a series-ending strikeout of Trent Grisham on a changeup.

Before any of that, the game turned on a play that will live in October highlight reels for a very long time. With two outs in the bottom of the sixth and the Rays ahead 4-2, Volpe launched a long drive toward left field off Jax. A fan reached over the wall and caught the ball above the glove of a leaping Mesa — who was the same man who had just put Tampa Bay ahead. The umpires originally signaled a game-tying two-run homer. Volpe rounded the bases and went through a line of high-fives in the dugout before the crew chiefs sent it to the replay center.

The verdict brought the stadium to a standstill: the ball would not have left the playing field, and Mesa would not have caught it. Volpe was awarded an RBI double, George Lombard Jr. was allowed to score from first, and the Rays led 4-3 instead of watching a 4-4 game. Jax recovered to strike out Spencer Jones and end the inning. Thirty years after 12-year-old Jeffrey Maier reached over the right-field wall to help Derek Jeter’s drive become a home run in Game 1 of the 1996 ALCS, replay review turned a Yankee Stadium fan controversy the other way. “Crazy,” Volpe said of watching the replay. “I was just seeing it through the replay and just hoping for the best, but ... crazy.”

The inning also showcased baseball’s newest technology. Lombard reached on a one-out walk after a 3-1 pitch called a strike by plate umpire Dan Bellino was ruled inside on an ABS challenge, and Austin Wells walked before an ABS challenge from Rays catcher Liam Hicks turned a full-count changeup into a called third strike. MLB allowed ball-and-strike challenges for the first time this season, and both sides used them within minutes in the biggest inning of the year.

Boone shuffled his lineup in a last attempt to find offense, sitting Chisholm — 0-for-6 with a walk in the series and the author of a Game 2 throwing error — in favor of Volpe at second base and José Caballero at third for Ryan McMahon. The moves produced almost nothing. Trent Grisham batted leadoff and went 0-for-5 with three strikeouts. Volpe finished 2-for-4. Caballero went 0-for-2. Chisholm entered as a pinch hitter in the seventh, popped out on the second pitch to boos from the sellout crowd, and later hit into a fielder’s choice in the ninth before stranding the tying run at second when Grisham struck out to end the season.

After the Yankees spent two games beating themselves — a 1-0 shutout loss in Game 1, four errors in a 5-2 Game 2 defeat — they simply got beat in Game 3. Five runs in three games. Five hits in the first two. Aaron Judge watched from the dugout, his right calf strain keeping the three-time MVP off the ALDS roster and leaving the Yankees without the one bat that could have changed the math. “I thought we had some good at-bats tonight,” Boone said. “Gave ourselves some opportunities, hit some balls on the screws again, but ultimately not enough. We gotta be more complete offensively, defensively, pitching. We did a lot of really good things this year, but ultimately not good enough to beat a really good Rays team tonight.”

The loss was the Yankees’ fourth in nine seasons under Boone and the 11th in franchise history. The World Series drought reaches 17 straight years, and the offseason arrives with a lockout looming over the sport. The Rays, meanwhile, move on as the AL’s standard-bearer — dominant pitching, mistake-free baseball, and a rookie in right field who has already authored two series-defining plays. Monday, the ALCS begins at home. October doesn’t do encores, but it does do rematches — and Tampa Bay will be waiting to see whether it’s Chicago or Cleveland. Read the Game 2 breakdown, the Game 3 preview, and all of Previously’s MLB coverage.