‘Relentless’ Ernie Clement and Blue Jays Oust Yankees From Division Series

NEW YORK — Ernie Clement simply wore out Yankees pitchers during the Division Series. After collecting three hits in Game 2 — including a two-run homer off Max Fried that opened the scoring — in a Blue Jays win, then four more hits in their Game 3 defeat, the 29-year-old infielder sparked rallies in Game 4 with a pair of singles that led to the go-ahead run in the fifth inning and then two more runs in the seventh, helping Toronto break the game open. Backed by opener Louis Varland and seven other relievers who combined to hold the Yankees to six hits and two runs, the Blue Jays bounced their AL East rivals with a 5-2 victory in Game 4.

While Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (.529/.550/1.059) and Daulton Varsho (.438/.471/1.000) were the Blue Jays’ heaviest hitters in the series, combining for five homers and 13 RBI, Clement — who spent time at all four infield positions this year and started games at both second and third base in this series — hit .643/.625/.929 himself while scoring and driving in five runs apiece. Though he showed a wide platoon split during the regular season, producing a 146 wRC+ (.326/.351/.549) against lefties and 75 wRC+ (.254/.295/.327) against righties, both of his Game 4 singles were off fireballing righty Cam Schlittler, who was very good if not nearly as dominant as he had been against the Red Sox in the Wild Card Series finale.

“I think Ernie Clement has made everyone aware of how good he is,” said manager John Schneider after the game. “It’s been like that the whole year for the bottom part of our lineup. You try to navigate it to where guys can put the ball in play, guys can get on base for guys at the top.

“Ernie had an unbelievable first postseason series for a guy that has been through it a little bit,” he continued. “I think he kind of epitomizes what we are in terms of how we play. So I’m thrilled for him, but the bottom part of our lineup has been relentless the entire season.”

Schneider was alluding to the path Clement took to the Blue Jays. Drafted out of the University of Virginia in the fourth round by Cleveland in 2017, he reached the majors in ’21, but hit just .214/.273/.274 in 103 games in that season and the next before being released in September 2022. He caught on with the A’s but played just six games for them late in the season, then drew his release in the middle of spring training in 2023. He signed with the Blue Jays but spent most of that season at Triple-A Buffalo, then went from battling for the 26th roster spot in the spring of 2024 to playing 139 games in the majors, mainly at third base and shortstop. This year, he spent substantial stretches at third and second, the latter while Andrés Giménez was sidelined due to an ankle sprain, and late in the season dabbled at shortstop after Bo Bichette went down with a left knee sprain. With combined totals of 21 DRS and 9 FRV, Clement was a key cog in one of the majors’ best defenses.

On the offensive side, Clement is something of a study in extremes. In addition to his wide platoon split — which followed up a large reverse split last year (104 wRC+ in 307 PA against righties, 72 wRC+ in 145 PA against lefties) — he ranked in just the eighth percentile in average exit velocity (86.6 mph) and sixth percentile in barrel rate (2.4%), but in the 97th percentile in squared-up rate (36.9%). Among qualifiers, both his 4.6% walk rate and 10.4% strikeout rate ranked among the majors’ seven-lowest marks.

“Ernie has elite bat-to-ball skills, and I’ve seen him cover a foot above the zone and a foot below the zone. With that comes a little bit of volatility with the results,” said Schneider prior to Game 4. “Ernie is not scared of any situation. I think his play kind of shows that, the way he plays the game, whether it’s on the bases, on defense, or at the plate.”

Despite losing the battle of the bullpens on Tuesday night, Schneider and the Blue Jays projected no shortage of confidence, starting with choice of Varland to serve as an opener for a bullpen game after said bullpen had finished the job of coughing up a 6-1 lead by allowing six runs in 5 1/3 innings. Varland himself served up Aaron Judge’s game-tying three-run homer in Game 3, and Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s go-ahead solo shot the best hitter on the planet needed the cooperation of the wind and the Yankee Stadium ghosts to turn a 99.7-mph four-seamer 1.2 feet off the center of the plate into some timely runs. With Max Scherzer having struggled down the stretch and both Chris Bassitt and José Berríos ending the regular season sidelined due to injuries, the Blue Jays brought only three starters into the series, hence the choice to go with an all-reliever approach for Game 4. Though Schneider mentioned that Game 2 starter Trey Yesavage, who no-hit the Yankees for 5 1/3 innings in just his fourth major league start, was available for certain scenarios, he never had to call his number.

One other reason for confidence, or at least optimism on the Blue Jays’ part, was their previous success against Schlittler, who himself was making just his 16th major league start since getting called up on July 9. On August 30 in New York, the Jays chased him after he’d allowed five hits, two walks and four runs in 1 2/3 innings — the worst start of his stellar half-season.

The Blue Jays quickly did what the Red Sox could not in his eight-inning start last week: score a run on Schlittler. Leadoff hitter George Springer scalded his first second pitch, a 97.2-mph four-seam fastball, into the left field corner for a 107.5-mph double. After Nathan Lukes flied out, Guerrero sliced a cutter down the right field line for an RBI single; six pitches in, the Blue Jays led 1-0. Addison Barger singled to right to send Guerrero to third, but Alejandro Kirk popped out foul to catcher Austin Wells, and then Cody Bellinger slid into foul territory to catch Varsho’s fly ball down the left field line.

Varland, making his fourth appearance in the series, allowed a loud single to Judge in the first inning and hit Paul Goldschmidt in the back with a 98-mph sinker with one out in the second before yielding to lefty Mason Fluharty, who struck out both Wells and Anthony Volpe. Fluharty served up a solo homer to Ryan McMahon, just the third he hit off a lefty all season and his first such homer since being acquired from the Rockies on July 25. But the Yankees couldn’t do any other damage against the next five relievers Schneider called upon, namely Seranthony Domínguez, Eric Lauer, Yariel Rodríguez, Brendon Little and Braydon Fisher, who combined to hold the Yankees to two hits and five walks over the next 5 1/3 innings. Not until the sixth did the Yankees even put two men on base at the same time; they did so in that inning when Lauer intentionally walked Judge with one out and then Yariel Rodríguez entered and walked Giancarlo Stanton before retiring Chisholm on a groundball.

Schlittler did not have the same kind of swing-and-miss stuff on Wednesday night as he did against the Red Sox, but his four-seam fastball still averaged a sizzling 98 mph and reached as high as 99.7 mph, and what he lacked in dominance, he made up for in efficiency. Through four innings, he threw just 47 pitches, generating five whiffs and seven called strikes, and from the second through the fourth gave up just one hit, a leadoff double to Barger in the fourth. He retired Clement, the eighth hitter in the lineup, in the second inning, but it required a great over-the-shoulder grab on a dying quail by Volpe in shallow left field to do so.

Clement led off the fifth by taking a 97.6-mph four-seamer for a strike, then flaring a 94.6-mph cutter in the lower third of the zone into left field for a single. He sped to third when Giménez followed with a single to center field, and scored on a sacrifice fly when Springer flied out to center.

The score was still 2-1, and Schlittler still on the mound, when Clement batted again with one out in the seventh, after Anthony Santander had fouled out to McMahon. On the first pitch, Schlittler left a 98.4-mph fastball in the middle of the zone, and Clement drilled it into right field for a single. Giménez followed with a hot grounder up the middle that deflected off the glove of Chisholm, who was clearly thinking double play; the ball caromed into center field as Clement took third.

That ended Schlittler’s night at 88 pitches, 69 of which were strikes. In 6 2/3 innings, he surrendered eight hits and struck out two, and for the second start in a row didn’t walk anybody. Devin Williams, who threw 26 pitches in Game 3, came in and threw Springer seven straight changeups at the bottom of the zone or just below it, finally striking him out, but Giménez stole second on the last of those. Two pitches later, Lukes singled to center, bringing both runners home (the runs were unearned), extending the Blue Jays lead to 4-1.

The Blue Jays added another in the eighth against Camilo Doval thanks to a leadoff double by Kirk and then, one out later, a bloop into right field by Myles Straw; Doval then hit Clement in the back with a 95.7-mph cutter, but he was soon erased on a forceout.

Now trailing 5-1, the Yankees had their chance to tie the game in the eighth. With two outs, Stanton singled off Fisher, and both Chisholm and pinch-hitter Ben Rice drew walks, the latter against closer Jeff Hoffman, who nonetheless got Wells to hit a routine flyball to left field on the first pitch of his plate appearance. Though the Yankees tacked on a run in the ninth on to a pinch-double by Jasson Domínguez and a long single off the left field wall by Judge, he was the last baserunner of their season; Bellinger struck out chasing a low-and-away splitter, and that was that. The Blue Jays won their first playoff series since 2016, when they beat the Orioles in the AL Wild Card Game and then swept the Rangers in the Division Series before falling to Cleveland in a five-game ALCS.

Clement, who hit ninth against righty Luis Gil in Game 1 and sixth against lefties Fried and Carlos Rodón in Games 2 and 3, wasn’t alone in stirring up trouble at the bottom of the lineup. For the series, the Blue Jays’ six through nine hitters — a cast that at times included Varsho, Barger, Straw, and Giménez — combined to bat .322/.390/.424 with 10 RBI, leaving Yankees pitchers fewer places to turn for outs and the Blue Jays to 8.5 runs per game for the series. What they lacked in power (Clement was the only one to homer from one of those spots), they made up for with their extreme penchant for contact, striking out just eight times in 68 plate appearances (11.7%), which in this case forced a wobbly Yankees defense to make play — and sometimes they didn’t. During the regular season, the Blue Jays’ six through nine hitters combined to bat .253/.320/.388 for a 99 wRC+, fourth in the majors from those spots; their 18.7% strikeout rate was the majors’ lowest, just as the team’s overall rate of 17.8% was the lowest as well. Clement himself didn’t strike out once in 16 plate appearances.

“I got a lot of responsibility down at the bottom of that lineup trying to get on for our big guns,” Clement said. “Giménez [who went 4-for-15 with a double] has also done a tremendous job getting on base. It feels like the bottom of our order does something to help us win literally every game. So I think it’s been huge.”

Amid the postgame celebration in the visitors’ clubhouse at Yankee Stadium, where players made beer angels on the floor, Clement was lost the revelry. “I don’t know where I am right now!” he exclaimed. Soon enough, he and the Blue Jays — the AL’s number one seed for the postseason — will find themselves back at the Rogers Centre, waiting to play the winner of the Mariners-Tigers Division Series.

Davy Andrews contributed to this report.