Yankees - 000 000 000 - 0 1 0
Rays - 001 000 00x - 1 5 0
This is the 14th time in postseason history a team has allowed 0 hits in the first seven innings of a game.
First time since the Astros (2022 WS G4) threw a combined (four pitchers) no-hitter.
Longest individual no-hit bids in postseason history:
2010 NLDS G1 Roy Halladay: No-hitter
1956 WS G5 Don Larsen: Perfect game
1947 WS G4 Bill Bevens: 8.2 IP
2026 ALDS G1 Drew Rasmussen: 7.2 IP
2019 NLCS G1 Anibal Sánchez: 7.2 IP
1967 WS G2 Jim Lonborg: 7.2 IP
1942 WS G1 Red Ruffing: 7.2 IP
Drew Rasmussen faced only two Yankees with a runner on base. He struck each of them out to end the inning.
Tampa Bay third baseman Junior Caminero has the ball in his glove (0:12 in this video).
Yankees' Austin Wells breaks up Drew Rasmussen's no-hit bid in eighth — and gets thrown out at third in stunner
Mark W. Sanchez, Post
Luis Rojas raised his arms straight up to form the universal sign for "stop." Stop signs are irrelevant, though, if they are not seen in time.
Austin Wells only picked up his third base coach when he had rounded second base and . . . turned the best moment of the Yankees' night into the worst within seconds.
Wells broke up Drew Rasmussen's no-hitter with two outs in the eighth, only to get thrown out trying to stretch a double into a triple . . . which helped lead to a 1-0 loss to the Rays in Game 1 of the ALDS at Tropicana Field. . . .
Entering the at-bat, Rasmussen had retired 23 Yankees and only let two reach base on walks. He had struck out 10. He was about as dominant as a pitcher can be. A one-run deficit, on the strength of a Jonathan Aranda home run, felt insurmountable.
And then Wells stepped up and provided life, energy and joy — for all of about 10 seconds.
The Yankees catcher blistered a rare Rasmussen miss, a sinker that cut across the middle of the plate . . . down the right field line . . . fair by maybe a foot. The ball pinballed from a wall in foul territory to another facing of the wall in fair territory. . . .
The owner of one of the most potent cannons in the majors, [Victor] Mesa threw a strike to cutoff man Taylor Walls, who did not even have to rush a throw to third: He threw, but did not fire, to third baseman Junior Caminero, who had plenty of time to tag Wells. . . .
Wells remained on the dirt for a few seconds, and it would have been understandable if he dug a hole and remained there for the rest of a game in which the Yankees would not record a second hit.
Oh, there's third base, that little white square on the left.
Yankees get one-hit in brutal Game 1 ALDS loss to Rays
Greg Joyce, Post
Wells . . . was thrown out easily trying to stretch a double into a triple, delivering one more gut punch on the way to a 1-0 loss to the Rays and a 1-0 deficit in the best-of-five series . . .
"We didn't really have much going on . . ." Wells said in a quiet visiting clubhouse. "[I] thought I had a good chance to get there. Can't hang your head too much." . . .
With the Yankees four outs away from becoming the fourth team in postseason history to be no-hit, Wells [doubled to right and] was just over halfway to second base when third base coach Luis Rojas threw up a stop sign. . . . The slow-footed catcher was thrown out easily at third base . . .
"Obviously not a good decision there," manager Aaron Boone said. . . .
The play sent the packed house . . . into a frenzy, as Rasmussen continued his dominance of the Yankees with a whale of a game: eight shutout innings, 10 strikeouts and two walks. . . .
[Wells:] "You have to take risks, but in that situation, obviously the risk was wrong."
Giancarlo Stanton strikes out in first Yankees at-bat in over five months — why Aaron Boone 'liked what I saw'
Greg Joyce, Post
[Giancarlo Stanton's] first at-bat in five-plus months . . . was one of the few things [Aaron Boone] liked in the Yankees' 1-0 loss to the Rays in Game 1 of the ALDS on Saturday night at Tropicana Field.
With the Yankees trailing by a run in the top of the ninth, and Rays righty closer Bryan Baker entering from the bullpen, Boone sent Stanton up to pinch hit . . . to lead off the frame.
Stanton, who last took an at-bat April 24 because of three separate calf strains, ended up striking out on five pitches. The veteran slugger fouled off the first pitch, took two balls and a strike, then foul-tipped a 96 mph fastball on the inner third into the catcher's mitt for Strike 3. . . .
"[I] felt the threat of Giancarlo — I thought he had a really good at-bat. . . . I liked what I saw. He took the right at-bat." . . .
Drew Rasmussen was superlative in every single way for Rays — and he made it look easy
Mike Vaccaro
It's supposed to be harder than this. It's certainly supposed to look harder than this. . . .
Rasmussen, he looked like he had a beer and a hot dog on the mound with him, looked like he was retreating to a chaise lounge while his teammates were whipping the ball around the infield, out after out, inning after inning, for 7.2 innings, all while clinging to the skinniest lead that the law allows: 1-0. . . .
He was — pick your adjective — masterful. Dominant. Splendid. Magnificent. Mostly, he looked completely unfazed by the moment. . . . One Yankee after another he stared down with cold eyes and cold-blooded precision. . . .
[In the eighth, Rasmussen missed his spot] and Austin Wells shot it down the right-field line, and Wells apparently was so stunned that Rasmussen had tossed it down the pipe that as he rounded second base he believed he was running on Rickey Henderson's legs. He was not. . . .
Drew Rasmussen's masterclass places all pressure on the Yankees going forward
Joel Sherman, Post
Good luck to the Yankees getting to three wins first in a series in which Rasmussen can start twice.
Think about the pressure on Cam Schlittler and the rest of the team for Monday night in Game 2 . . . Think about the stress now to win every non-Rasmussen start after he held the Yankees hitless for seven innings en route to eight shutout innings in a 1-0 victory in this ALDS opener. . . .
Rays manager Kevin Cash is notorious for removing his then-ace Blake Snell while he was working on an overwhelming two-hit shutout in the sixth inning of 2020 World Series Game 6 . . . Tampa Bay blew that game, and the Dodgers clinched a title.
There was no chance of Cash repeating that Saturday with Rasmussen . . . On Sept. 22, in the nightcap of a doubleheader, Rasmussen no-hit the Yankees for six innings as the Rays clinched the AL East title. . . .
[He held] the Yankees hitless until Austin Wells doubled with two down in the eighth. Wells inexplicably tried to take third. . . . [W]ith two outs, in the game of risk vs. reward, this was unacceptable to the highest level. And so in the span of about 10 seconds, Wells navigated from being the Yankees whole offense to their goat when he was easily thrown out. . . .
If Game 4 is necessary, Rasmussen can start on full rest or be held for a potential Game 5. . . .
You see how this intensifies what the Yankees must do in the other games against a Rays team that pitches well beyond Rasmussen, plays clean in the field and is now 56-26 at home. . . .
[O]ne run beat the Yankees. . . . Including Rays closer Bryan Baker's 1-2-3 ninth, the Yankees were 0-for-19 with 12 strikeouts with two strikes . . .
Talk was circulating among some overexcited guessers that New York's marquee baseball franchise might duplicate the Knicks' magical run after they swept the rival Red Sox two straight games in The Bronx.
But down here, before a hostile sellout crowd and a better team than Boston with a much better plan, the Yankees provided zero magic and registered only one hit against known Yankee killer Drew Rasmussen. . . .
You could almost feel the wind from all their swings and misses over Rasmussen's eight pristine innings inside this depressing brutalist edifice . . . There were 10 pinstriped strikeouts and 23 swings and misses as Rasmussen remains a career mystery to them. . . .
[In the eighth,] non-speedster Austin Wells . . . was easily thrown out at third trying to stretch a double with two outs in the eighth. We hadn't seen much baserunning to that point, but it turns out that was worse than the hitting, which was virtually nonexistent. . . .
Anyway, now comes the first October crisis. The Yankees will need to beat the Rays three out of four to get past this division series now. That will not be easy. . . .
The Rays . . . do everything right and well. They squeeze the best out of their ability . . .
The Yankees need to be better to take this series. . . . Maybe start with a couple of hits, and throw in better decisions, too.
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