Once again, Yankees fall short in quest for a World Series title

The Blue Jays sprayed champagne late Wednesday night to Frank Sinatra crooning “New York, New York,” in the visitors clubhouse at the Stadium.

Down the hall, the Yankees dressed to an all-too-familiar October soundtrack: the screeching rolls of plastic packing tape.

No goggles. No ALCS T-shirts. Not even a few stray cans of Bud Light.

Just cardboard boxes multiplying as fast as the clubhouse attendants could whip them together. And the same feeling of emptiness the Yankees keep carrying back home with them every winter, now going on 16 years, with failure riding shotgun.

There’s no way to sugarcoat the Yankees bowing out of the Division Series with Wednesday night’s 5-2 loss to the Blue Jays, who won Game 4 by deploying a carousel of eight relief pitchers because they were all out of starters.

That’s right. The 2025 Yankees, the team that featured one of MLB’s best performing rotations over the last six weeks, was paying $218 million to Max Fried and found a future star down the stretch in Cam Schlittler, still couldn’t beat Toronto, which basically had 2 1/2 starters (including a rookie) on their Division Series staff.

With the Yankees, despite a $320 million roster this season, it’s always something. Either the defense falters, as Jazz Chisholm Jr. did Wednesday night by botching a tailor-made double play grounder that cost them two unearned runs or the bullpen stumbles in a high-leverage spot or the lineup malfunctions at the most crucial time.

Sixteen years, a dozen playoff appearances, zero World Series rings. Historically, the Yankees have always considered playing in October a birthright, with the Bronx being the home office for the Fall Classic.

But after cracking the code last year, and finally getting to the World Series for the first time since winning it in 2009, the Yankees went backward this season, falling two rounds short of their stated goal. They did win 94 games, which was just enough to lose the AL East title to the Blue Jays on a head-to-head tiebreaker, then ultimately get beat by them again a week later.

As the Yankees seemingly built playoff momentum over the final month of the regular season, Aaron Boone repeatedly said this was the best team he ever had during his eight-year tenure as manager. That turned out to be a damning indictment after this roster only advanced past the Wild Card Series, and barely sneaked by a far inferior Red Sox team to do so.

“The ending’s the worst, right?,” Boone said. “Especially when you know you have a really good group and a group of guys that really came together so well at the right time. This was a team. It’s a team that played for one another, did a lot of really good things, and we got beat here.”

But if these Yankees, Boone’s best-ever, couldn’t win a World Series, then when is it ever going to happen? They have Aaron Judge, the most dangerous offensive player on the planet about to earn his third MVP trophy, and still can’t put enough around him to get a ring.

Statistically, Judge put together his most awesome October, batting .500 (13-for-26) with two doubles, seven RBIs and the dramatic pole-denting homer in Game 3 that people will be telling their grandchildren about. And the Yankees managed only one win against the Blue Jays, getting outscored 23-8 in two losses at Rogers Centre and no-showing in Wednesday night’s Game 4.

“It’s tough to describe,” Judge said, still wearing his uniform long after the final out. “We didn’t do our job. Didn’t finish the goal. Had a special group in here. A lot of special players that made this year fun. But we didn’t get the ultimate prize.”

On Wednesday night, it was Ryan McMahon who supplied the entirety of the offense for eight innings, as his leadoff homer in the third tied the score at 1. Judge tacked on the other run with an RBI single after Jasson Dominguez — remember him? — opened the ninth with a double.

The never-used Martian entered as pinch hitter for Anthony Volpe, who looked completely lost at the plate during the Division Series. Volpe seemed to take a step backward this season, partially due to playing through a left shoulder injury, but Game 4 was rock bottom. After Volpe struck out for a third time, the crowd of 47,823 loudly booed him, and Boone was probably doing him a favor by sending out Dominguez instead for the ninth. Afterward, he was practically in tears describing the abrupt end to another season.

“It was brutal,” said Volpe, who struck out 16 times in 26 at-bats during the playoffs. “Kind of in shock . . . Sure there will be a lot of sleepless nights, thinking back on it.”

Now it’s GM Brian Cashman’s turn to troubleshoot what went wrong during the long winter ahead. He’s got some big free-agent pieces to consider, chief among them Cody Bellinger, who ended this Yankees’ failed campaign — and triggered the Blue Jays on-field celebration — by striking out. Bellinger suggested he was opting out of his current deal, but would welcome a return to the Bronx.

“Yeah, absolutely,” Bellinger said. “I had an unbelievable time putting on this uniform. Yankee Stadium, the fans, the organization, the culture that these guys have created in this locker room. It really is special.”

But not special enough, apparently. Ask the partying Blue Jays about that.

David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball’s Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.