Drew Rasmussen Does Very Rude Things to the Yankees in ALDS Game 1
Generally picked to win the AL East before the 2026 season, the New York Yankees spent the final four months of the season looking up at the Tampa Bay Rays in the standings. If the Bombers were hoping to avenge their second-place finish in their Division Series matchup with their AL East foe, they got off to a poor start on Saturday evening, losing 1-0 in a game that felt more lopsided than the one-run margin would suggest. Taking a no-hitter into the eighth inning, Drew Rasmussen dominated the Yankees, with his bid for history only spoiled by an Austin Wells two-out double that the New York catcher unsuccessfully tried to stretch into a triple. Bryan Baker quickly dispatched the Yankees in the ninth to give the Rays a 1-0 series lead to match the final score.
In a game without much in the way of offense, Rasmussen was the biggest story. Unfazed by a New York lineup that consisted almost entirely of lefties — not entirely surprising as Rasmussen has shown no platoon differential over his major league career — he freely mixed his four pitches, with the Yankees not having an answer for any of them. Rasmussen struck out 10 batters over eight innings and still cruised enough that, if the Rays’ cushion had been larger, he may very well have been sent out for the complete game in the ninth.
As playoff starts go, Rasmussen’s stands out not just as a pretty darn good start, but one that was good enough to rank with the best in recent history. Bill James’ Game Score is useful for this kind of thing, and Rasmussen’s Game Score of 88 is tied for the 15th-best playoff start of the Wild Card era (1995-present). Among games of the last decade, only Blake Snell’s 2025 NLCS Game 1 start ranks higher. Snell’s performance featured a final line that was nearly identical to Rasmussen’s (8 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 10 K, but no walks).
Dan Szymborski is a senior writer for FanGraphs and the developer of the ZiPS projection system. He was a writer for ESPN.com from 2010-2018, a regular guest on a number of radio shows and podcasts, and a voting BBWAA member. He also maintains a terrible Twitter account at @DSzymborski.
I don’t think any fans other than Yankee fans care about the silver lining mentioned. The earlier NY is eliminated, the better.
Disagree
That was a very good game, as expected. I fully expect Schlittler to go do the same thing in G2, but if not it will be a little easier to start getting excited.
I’m anxious to see how the Rays do against Schlitter. These teams know each other very well, and I had guessed the Yankees would perform a little better this time out against Ras. Nope.
“Part of me wonders whether Rays manager Kevin Cash was secretly relieved that Rasmussen’s no-hitter was broken up, as letting a pitcher try to finish a no-hitter in a 1-0 game is a whole lot scarier than in an 8-0 laugher.” No part of me wonders whether Kevin Cash was relieved when Wells got that hit. It is easy to remember that Cash was the first to yank a starter who cruising when in Game 6 of the 2020 World Series he pulled Snell, who was pitching brilliantly, in the 6th after he gave up his first hit and had thrown only 73 pitches. Thankfully Karma intervened and his very questionable move bit him but you can be assured that he was horrified at the thought of having to let Rasmussen go out for the 9th if the no-hitter was still intact.
Remember, I revel in uncertainty!
if you’re going to mention game 6, try not to forget that Cash let Snell try to pitch out of almost the exact same jam in game 2 of that same WS. it puts a little more context into the decision to pull Snell in G6
Yankees remind me of 2005 White Sox. Dominant starting pitching, good defense and 1 very good hitter. Injured HoF
We can expect many of their games to go something like this
An excellent write-up. As someone who watches every game while looking at GameDay and Statcast simultaneously, this write-up contained information I wouldn’t normally research, specifically GameScore and whiff rates for pitches as opposed to what I normally look at: whiff totals. A few points (which are supposed to show up as bullet points, but they are not on my screen):
Despite the fact that he gave up no hits, long-time Rays watchers agreed that Rasmussen was not throwing well in innings 2 and 3. He gave up two walks, which is uncharacteristic for him. Many of his pitches were uncompetitive. And the Yankees hitters were taking pitches. Fortunately, Aranda hit his homer…
After which, the Yankees started swinging at pitches out of the zone, including a ridiculous one by Bellinger to strike out in the 4th. At the same time, Ras’s pitches out of the zone were becoming competitive. He was excellent from innings 4 through 6. However,
Statcast shows the speed of Rasmussen’s pitches was down a mph or two by the 7th inning and definitely by the 8th. In fact, towards the end, Ras was getting hit hard. In the 7th, both Jrs, Garcia and Lombard, had squared up balls that were a coin flip from being hits. Two more hard-hit balls by NYY occurred in the 8th. I suspect Ras would have been pulled after 7 innings if this had been a regular-season game. However, Cash said that pitch counts (Ras was at 94 after 7 innings) would be ignored during the playoffs. He had another inning to see if the hard-hit balls of the 7th were a fluke.
The other interesting story from the Rays side was Baker. A two-pitch reliever who relies on his fastball, Baker threw 4 fastballs and 10 changeups. His last four changeups were approximately 82 mph. Toward the end of the season, Baker’s fastball had lost some zip, enough that they pulled him early in one game. While he did hit 96 mph, his last fastball was only 94 mph.
Finally, I highly doubt Ras would have pitched the 9th even if Wells’ screamer had been caught. Traditionalists might have been offended, but the Rays play for the win as a team, not as individuals. I’m certain Cash and the Rays have analyzed the Game 6 of the WS decision enough to know when to pull a starter and when not to. Fortunately for Cash, whoever’s decision to have Wells try for 3rd base solved everything. The no-hitter was gone, hence the lazy narrative, but so were the Yankees in that inning. Cash didn’t have to warm up Booser and Kelly, and he had a full half-inning to warm up Baker.
Wells going to third was one of those mistakes you see happen in the MLB like a couple times a season across the entire MLB… yet we saw it in the playoffs in basically the worst situation to try and “make something happen” imaginable. Just completely incomprehensible
It was Wells’ decision to run to 3rd. The 3rd-base coach, Rojas, threw up his hands to stop him at 2nd. And Wells SAW Rojas throw up his hands.
Oh I know he wasn’t told to run, it was just insane for him to think it was something he should do in that situation
Sorry, this comment wasn’t directed at you; it was meant to provide general information.
But maybe we shouldn’t be so surprised, as Dan Sz might point out. Wells is a 27-year-old veteran with 24 games of playoff experience. The myth of playoff experience and veteran presence required for the playoffs takes another hit.
I am placing Wells TOOTBLAN in the Top 10 of all-time.
Easily top 1000
One quibble: the Yankees were emphatically not chosen by Fangraphs writers to win the AL east. In fact I think only one writer predicted they’d win it.
Your point stands, but Dan’s article didn’t say FG staff, and FG staff nearly unanimously predicted NYY to finish well ahead of TBR (6 division winners vs. 0, 22/25 make playoffs vs. 2/25)
The only negative of the magical White Sox season is that it has made me underappreciate the Rays all year.
both of those throws were beautiful, Tom Emansky would be proud
And the camera cuts butcher the play again.
Of all the things we complain about in baseball nothing upsets me more than the camera cuts away from the ball to the runner.
No other sport is there ever a deliberate live camera cut away from the ball.
But this happens constantly in baseball during the most action-packed parts.
Do mainstream audiences really truly appreciate this? There’s no way.
It’s like in Football if the camera cut to a close up of a receiver making his route cut the moment the QB cocked his arm.
Just zoom out!
And rely on the broadcasters telling us the guy is running.
Which they did a fabulous job of in the clip above. The sudden dropoff in excitement from “Wells DIVES!” to “Oh goodness gracious he’s out by 3ft” is spectacular and totally meme-worthy.