For most of the first two weeks of the 2026 season, just about everything was coming up Yankees. In what was supposed to be a highly competitive division, the Yankees burst out of the gate with eight wins in their first 10 games. None of those victories came against pushover teams, and they were also convincing wins, with the lineup scoring more than twice the team’s runs allowed. Just as importantly, the teams expected to rival the Yankees all got off to mediocre (or worse) starts. The Bronx Bombers had a 3 1/2 game cushion in the AL East, about as large as one can reasonably hold in a tough division after 10 games. Then, things happened.

After the games of April 7, ZiPS had the Yankees with a projected two-game edge in the East, and a 35% chance of winning the division. While these numbers didn’t suggest dominance or anything remotely resembling a guarantee, that was a four-game swing from the preseason projected standings (New York was initially two games back of Boston) and a solid bump from their 20% odds to win the division.

While none of the games were one-sided affairs, the Yankees proceeded to drop five in a row against the Athletics and Rays, only winning on Monday in the ninth inning against the Angels after a Jordan Romano meltdown. Had they lost, it would have left the Yankees without a share of first place for the first time this season.

As of Tuesday morning, ZiPS projects the divisional race between the top four teams in the East to be close enough to send my colleague Jay Jaffe into full Team Entropy excitement. Or at least, it would if MLB hadn’t ruined bonus baseball with the blasphemy of tiebreakers. Here are the projected standings:

The Yankees may have lost their best chance to put the division away early. The Orioles are missing Jackson Holliday and Jordan Westburg, and will be without Zach Eflin for the rest of the season. They started out 3-6 after getting swept by the Pirates, but they got back to .500 on the backs of the White Sox. The Red Sox have started to occasionally score runs, and their pitching staff is too deep to be this far down the rankings in ERA and FIP. The Jays are scuffling at the moment with a rotation that’s been beset by injuries, but ZiPS still sees them as dangerous competition over the rest of the season.

This looks like it’s back to being a really fun race, especially if the overperforming Rays can continue to defy our preseason expectations. I’d like to think that there’s a chance I could live to see a five-way divisional tie after 162 games. But even if the East doesn’t prove to be that tight, it should be quite the gauntlet the rest of the way.