Four Errors Bury the Yankees: Rays Take 5-2 Win and a 2-0 ALDS Lead

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — The New York Yankees flew to Florida with a plan to steady themselves in the ALDS. On the second pitch of Game 2, third baseman Ryan McMahon couldn't handle Yandy Díaz's grounder. By the time the first inning ended, the Yankees had committed three errors on the first four batters Cam Schlittler faced. By the time the night ended at Tropicana Field, Tampa Bay had a 5-2 win, a 2-0 series lead, and the Yankees were one loss from watching the rest of October from home.

THE SEQUENCE — Read them in order, because the order is the story. One: McMahon couldn't handle Díaz's grounder on the second pitch of the game. Aaron Boone had said he was keeping the struggling McMahon at third base "to prioritize the defense" — and the defense collapsed on pitch two. Two: Jazz Chisholm Jr. overthrew Luis García Jr. trying to turn two on Junior Caminero's grounder. Three: catcher Austin Wells was called for catcher's interference on Liam Hicks — the Rays challenged the call and won. Four: rookie shortstop George Lombard Jr. overthrew first in the fifth inning, the frame that ended Schlittler's night and broke the game open. Three of Tampa Bay's five runs were unearned. You cannot hand a team like this one that many extra outs and survive it.

THE ACE — The presumptive AL Cy Young winner deserved better and got none of it. Schlittler lasted just 4 1/3 innings — his shortest postseason start — undone as much by the glove work behind him as anything he threw. Afterward, Schlittler owned what he could at the postgame podium: "Obviously it starts with me... it didn't seem like we really showed up today," the presumptive AL Cy Young winner told reporters. Hard to argue with either half of that. The defense did not show up, and when your ace is fighting the inning and the scoreboard at once, the night is gone.

THE ONE HEARTBEAT — If the Yankees have a pulse in this series, it is Ben Rice. He homered twice on Monday — solo shots in the fourth and eighth innings — accounting for all of New York's scoring not just in Game 2, but across both games of the series. It was his second multi-homer postseason game: he also went deep twice against Boston in the Wild Card round, including a grand slam. The Yankees are doing all of this without Aaron Judge, sidelined with a strained calf and off the roster entirely. Two runs in two games, both Rice solo shots, no Judge — that is the whole of the Yankees' October offense right now.

BOONE'S GAMBLE — The second pitch of the game is going to follow Aaron Boone all winter. He had kept the struggling McMahon at third base precisely "to prioritize the defense" — and the defense collapsed on pitch two. McMahon is 1-for-7 this postseason and was pinch-hit for by Paul Goldschmidt in the eighth inning. When the decision you make to protect your pitching blows up before your ace has thrown 10 pitches, there is nowhere to hide from it.

THE RAYS' SIDE — Tampa Bay did what Tampa Bay does: took the gifts and cashed them. Freddy Peralta retired the first nine Yankees he faced and allowed just one run — Rice's fourth-inning homer — over 4 2/3 innings. And when the fifth inning opened the door, Brooklyn's Richie Palacios walked through it with the two-run single that broke the game open. Elsewhere in Monday's playoff slate, the margins were just as thin — but no one else needed this little help from the other team.

THE GHOSTS — Four errors in a postseason game will wake every ghost this franchise has. The Yankees also committed four in Game 4 of the 2019 ALCS. The 2024 World Series Game 5 collapse is fresher — and Wells, behind the plate Monday night, was catching that night too. Lombard's miscue fits a pattern: his August streak of errors in six straight games tied a franchise record held since Chick Fewster in 1921. This is not a blip in the Yankees' story. It is a chapter.

THE SERIES MATH — The arithmetic is now brutal for New York. A 2-0 deficit in a best-of-five leaves no margin: lose Wednesday at Yankee Stadium and October is over. The Rays, meanwhile, are one win from the ALCS after winning a game they barely had to work for — five runs, three of them gifted, against an ace who was gone by the fifth. Tampa Bay took what the Yankees handed it and never gave the game back. That is the Rays' entire October formula, and it is one win from the pennant round.

GAME 3 — The series moves to Yankee Stadium on Wednesday, where the Yankees must win three straight to survive — a steeper climb than anything else left in this round. With Judge absent, the offense reduced to one man's solo homers, and a defense that committed four errors in nine innings, the task is enormous. Schlittler was right about one thing: it starts with him, and with everyone behind him. On Monday night, neither showed up. The Rays noticed. One more win, and they are in the ALCS.