Aaron Judge has his playoff moment, but then so do Guardians with dramatic Game 3 walk-off win over Yankees in ALCS
New York Yankees pitcher Clay Holmes (35) walks to the dugout after Cleveland Guardians first base David Fry (6) hits a game winning 2 run homer in the 10th inning during Game 3 of the American League Championship Series against the Guardians at Progressive Field in Cleveland on Oct. 17, 2024 Credit: Newsday/William Perlman
CLEVELAND
A kid in the stands during Game 3 of the ALCS at Progressive Field on Thursday held up a sign:
“BELIEVELAND,” it read.
But did the kid still believe when the Yankees led the Guardians by two runs with two outs in the bottom of the ninth?
If so, give that kid a hand.
Pinch hitter Jhonkensy Noel hit a tying homer off the previously impenetrable Luke Weaver, and Cleveland went on to take a dramatic 7-5 win on David Fry’s two-out, two-run homer off Clay Holmes in the 10th.
It was the first bullpen meltdown for the Yankees in this postseason. And the Yankees, who lead the best-of-seven series 2-1, lost despite major home run heroics of their own.
With his team trailing 3-1 in the eighth, Aaron Judge hit a tying two-run homer. Giancarlo Stanton followed with a go-ahead blast to give the Yankees a 4-3 lead. Both homers came on 1-and-2 pitches from elite (in the regular season) closer Emmanuel Clase.
Judge and Stanton went back-to-back and belly-to-belly. It was the kind of signature postseason moment Judge has been chasing since 2017. It was another example of prodigious postseason prowess by Stanton.
It just didn’t lead to a victory.
The mistakes the Yankees made weren’t just the pitches by Weaver and Holmes. It was letting the Guardians get off the mat in a series the Yankees were one out away — and then one strike away — from putting a stranglehold on.
“They’re able to come away with the last big swing there,” Judge said. “Time to move on to the next game.”
Said Yankees starter Clarke Schmidt: “They got the final punch tonight.”
But, oh, the punches the Yankees threw in the eighth were something to behold.
Clase had allowed five earned runs in 74 1⁄3 innings for a 0.70 ERA in the regular season. He saved 47 games. He may be the best current closer in baseball.
But Clase gave up a three-run homer by the Tigers’ Kerry Carpenter in Cleveland’s 3-0 loss in Game 2 of the ALDS and has allowed six earned runs in six innings in this postseason.
Baseball, man.
Judge came in to the faceoff with a postseason-sized piano on his broad back. He already was 0-for-3 with two strikeouts. Even after hitting an important tack-on two-run home run in Tuesday’s 6-3 Yankees victory in Game 2, he was hitting .143 in this postseason.
Judge’s failures in previous playoffs followed him into the batter’s box. So did his soon-to-be two-time AL MVP resume. But that’s the regular season. The playoffs are a different animal, as Clase and Judge can attest.
It was a classic at-bat between two of the game’s best. Clase got ahead of Judge 0-and-2 on a foul back and a swinging strike. Judge called timeout, and Clase threw a ball low and outside.
All three pitches were cutters at 99 mph. Nasty, nasty and nasty.
The fourth pitch was another cutter at the same speed. It was belt-high — the belt height of the 6-7 Judge — on the outside corner.
Judge lined the ball to right and it carried into the stands. The score was tied at 3.
“I thought it was too low,” he said. “My first thought was to try to be on second base.”
It was not a typical high, far and gone Judge-ian blast. Judge’s majestic home run to center on Tuesday at Yankee Stadium had a launch angle of 37 degrees and went 414 feet. You could make a sandwich while waiting for it to come down.
The homer on Thursday had a launch angle of 18 degrees and went 356 feet. If you took a bite of that sandwich, you missed it.
Stanton followed with a 390-foot go-ahead blast to just right of center on a 90-mph slider. That was after he spoiled three 99-mph cutters in a four-pitch span by fouling them off. Clase went to something else and lived to regret it.
The Yankees’ dugout erupted. Players spilled onto the field in as pure an expression of joy as you will ever see from professional athletes.
The Yankees added an insurance run in the ninth on Gleyber Torres’ sacrifice fly, and in the bottom of the inning, they were one out away from a 3-0 series lead.
After getting ahead 0-and-2, Weaver gave up a two-out double by Lane Thomas.
The 6-3, 250-pound Noel, a rookie from the Dominican Republic whose nickname is “Big Christmas,” launched the tying home run 404 feet into the leftfield stands.
Christmas came early for the Guardians and their fans.
In the 10th, Fry went 399 feet to left off Holmes. Ballgame.
It was bedlam in Cleveland.
Sorry.
Believeland.
Anthony Rieber covers baseball, as well as the NFL, NBA and NHL. He has worked at Newsday since Aug. 31, 1998, and has been in his current position since July 5, 2004.