Jeffrey Maier nearly had company.
With the Yankees on the brink of elimination, Anthony Volpe appeared to hit a game-tying two-run home run in the sixth inning of Wednesday night’s ALDS Game 3 against the Tampa Bay Rays in the Bronx.
But in a season-altering gut punch, an umpire review found that Volpe’s clutch, two-out blast against reliever Griffin Jax had some help.
Replays determined a fan’s outstretched hands aided the ball over the left-field wall. The initial call of a home run was overturned, resulting in an RBI ground-rule double for Volpe and leaving the Yankees trailing still, 4-3.
That proved to be the final score as the Rays completed a three-game sweep and extended the Yankees’ World Series drought to 17 years.
“It’s a broken clubhouse,” manager Aaron Boone said. “It’s what you go through as a team, as a family over the last eight, nine months getting ready for this, and there’s just — it’s the worst. It’s the worst.”
Tampa Bay tagged Yankees co-ace Max Fried for four runs — all with two outs — over his 5.2 innings. Rays rookie Victor Mesa Jr. delivered the decisive blow, with his tie-breaking two-run homer in the top of the sixth holding up as the game-winner.
But the lasting image Wednesday was Volpe’s 357-foot screamer caroming off of the fan’s hands — and Spencer Jones striking out moments later to strand Volpe at second base.
“You go from a tie game to down one, so it definitely sucks,” Fried said of the momentum shift. “He made a great swing, and it’s just the way the game goes sometimes. It’s unfortunate, because it changes the game.”
The scene was eerily reminiscent of Game 1 of the 1996 ALCS, when a 12-year-old Maier reached over the right-field wall at the old Yankee Stadium and caught a game-tying Derek Jeter home run in the eighth inning of an eventual Yankees victory.
Back then, MLB didn’t employ video replay, so that homer stood — and became an iconic image in Jeter’s dynastic Yankees’ first World Series run.
On Wednesday, the outcome was entirely different.
“When he hit it, to my eye looking out there, I was a little concerned right away because it felt like something — I wasn’t sure,” Boone said. “And then seeing the replay and seeing it unfold, I thought they did the right thing. I thought they got it right.”
The Yankees returned to the Bronx trailing 0-2 in the best-of-five playoff series after a pair of deflating losses at Tropicana Field, where they managed only one hit in Game 1 and committed four errors in Game 2.
Seeking a spark, Boone shook up the Yankees’ lineup for Game 3, including starting Volpe at second base over Jazz Chisholm Jr. and José Caballero at third base over Ryan McMahon.
The Yankees gave the ball to Fried — who tossed a six-inning, one-run gem against the Boston Red Sox in last week’s Wild Card Series — over Carlos Rodón (7-3, 2.67 ERA), whom they lined up for a potential Game 4 instead.
But Fried wasn’t at his best Wednesday, permitting an RBI single to Jonathan Aranda in the third inning, a solo homer to No. 9 hitter Ryan Vilade in the fourth, and Mesa’s go-ahead blast in the sixth.
“I threw a bad pitch. I left it up, and a guy hit a home run, which was two more runs [that] kind of put it out of reach,” Fried said. “It really sucks, because we played a good game. We played a really sound game and did enough to win, and unfortunately, I didn’t do enough to be able to hold up my end of the bargain.”
Each time the Rays scored, the Yankees responded with one run in the bottom of the inning.
But that wasn’t enough — not after Jax struck Jones out on three pitches immediately after Volpe’s homer was overturned.
With two outs in the eighth, pinch-hitter Giancarlo Stanton struck out against Kevin Kelly with the tying run at first base. And in the ninth, Trent Grisham went down swinging against Rays closer Bryan Baker for the final out, stranding a runner at second.
The Yankees totaled just five runs and 12 hits in the ALDS, batting a collective .130 — their lowest average in a multi-game postseason series ever.
“This is my fourth season. It’s four too many times having this taste in my mouth,” Volpe said. “At this point, I don’t even think ‘motivated’ is the right word. I think it’s just ‘pissed off.’ … I just feel like there’s too many chips added to your shoulder that it just feels like enough’s enough.”
This is the third year in a row that an opponent celebrated a playoff series victory at Yankee Stadium, following the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 2024 World Series and the Toronto Blue Jays in last year’s ALDS.
The 17-year championship drought is tied for the Yankees’ longest since they won their first World Series title in 1923.
“It’s very frustrating,” Chisholm said. “You can see it on my face — you can see it on everybody else’s face — that we’re not happy. Nobody wants to go home, and we have to go home and think about it for another four months.”
