Elimination games don't get much more tense than Red Sox–Yankees Game 2. When Ben Rice homered in the first for a 2-0 New York lead, Trevor Story responded in the top of the third with two RBI of his own. When Aaron Judge got a two-out fly ball to miss Jarren Duran's glove in the fifth, Story again tied the game with a dong just a couple of minutes later. And after a few more innings of hold-your-breath baseball, it was Jazz Chisholm, in the bottom of the eighth, who forced an exhale with a desperation sprint from first to home on a single that ensured the Yankees' season would continue for at least one more day.
The New York second baseman's night started innocuously: flyout, foul out, strikeout, then a walk with two gone and stellar reliever Garrett Whitlock on the mound. From there, he just needed an excuse to advance. Catcher Austin Wells, with his .275 OBP, is not exactly the guy you'd want at the plate in this scenario, but he worked what felt like a marathon at-bat against Whitlock. While everyone watched to see if Chisholm, the Yankees' leading base stealer, would try to swipe second, Wells watched a couple of balls go by, then pulled one foul. He took another ball, then made a half-swing for a 3-2 count, which meant that Chisholm would be going on the pitch. The batter fouled back one more, and then got his wood around just barely late enough to connect with a changeup.
Wells did not hit the ball hard, but he hit it just right. It kissed the line in right and bounced off the wall in foul territory, completely wrong-footing the outfielder Nate Eaton, who had to change course to retrieve it. This little misread gave Chisholm the edge he required, and the man in pinstripes blazed around third with single-minded purpose. The throw from Eaton arrived just as Chisholm was making his picture-perfect headfirst slide into the plate, but there was no doubt about whether or not he beat the tag. The Yankees had their run, and soon after their win.
I was thinking about this run in connection with an overturned play that kept the Detroit Tigers from taking the lead against the Cleveland Guardians earlier on Wednesday. The Tigers were not desperate like the Yankees were—their Game 2 loss means they still play another—but they were nevertheless playing the kind of game, against the kind of team, where every run felt precious. Before Cleveland broke through in the bottom of the eighth, the entire afternoon was played at either 0-0, 1-0, or 1-1. It could have been 2-1 Tigers in the fourth, a two-out RBI single by Javy Baez scoring a pair instead of a solo rider, were it not for Zach McKinstry, upon review, being thrown out at third just a beat before Dillon Dingler touched home. It's hard to say exactly what would have happened from there if McKinstry had been a little faster, or the throw a little slower, but I do think the difference between a bunch of innings at 1-1 vs. 2-1 is fairly significant.
This isn't a novel observation, but I still have to make it all the same after two days of reacquainting ourselves with postseason baseball: It's often a very small thing that separates a winner from a loser, or elation from depression. An extra mile per hour on a sprint, a better read on a carom, a pitch in a slightly different location—these change the entire narrative of a team's season. The way that October heroes like Chisholm are made is typically pretty consistent, even if the particulars are unique every time. They're the guys who, by skill or by effort or by chance or some combination of the three, are able to do just a little bit more, when nothing less than that will do.
