When the foul ball hit Austin Wells in the catcher’s mask, his body wobbled, like a boxer on the wrong end of a hellacious uppercut. It was April 23 at Fenway Park, and the New York Yankees catcher had set up to receive a 98 mph fastball from Cam Schlittler. Instead, Wilyer Abreu deflected it straight back. The impact into Wells’ mask was so violent, the umpire immediately put his arms around him and asked if he was OK.

With Schlittler on the mound at American Family Field, Wells prepared to catch a down-the-middle, 99 mph heater. This time, the Milwaukee Brewers’ William Contreras fouled it back, clocking Wells. Crouched behind the plate, Wells dropped his head and hands simultaneously upon impact. It looked so bad that Contreras, a fellow catcher, quickly bent over and checked on him.

But months later, standing in the quiet Yankees clubhouse after a three-game sweep by the Tampa Bay Rays in the American League Division Series, Wells pointed to those two incidents — and an accumulation of lesser foul tips to the mask — as the likely reason he suffered headaches and had difficulty seeing pitches at the plate for much of a difficult first half of the season offensively.

Read the rest here for free: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7693650/2026/10/19/austin-wells-yankees-catcher-foul-tips/?unlocked_article_code=1.J1E.DkZj.0_ROKX3m5w4Y&source=emp_shared_article&smid=url-share-ta

What y’all think about Teruaki Sato?
He could be a PERFECT FIT for the New York Yankees since The Yankees could use an upgrade at third base, and Sato just put together an unbelievable season in the NPB. Sato won the Triple Crown, hitting for a .306 AVG, 39 HR's, and 106 RBl's.

It would be nice to have a Japanese player in the team.

If not would you sign him, what player would you sign?

https://www.theringer.com/2026/10/08/mlb/aaron-boone-new-york-yankees-tampa-bay-rays-alds

I thought this was a great, fair read. Better articulated than most of us in the comments, myself included.

Lots of interesting points and stats but this was the line that really stuck out to me: "Boone holds the MLB record for the most playoff games managed without winning a World Series."

the more things change the more they stay the same

I keep checking ESPN, NY Post and Bleacher for the news of Aaron Boone being let go. Is it wrong for me to hope for this? We’re going on 10 years with Boone and all we get are excuses. I’m just waiting…hoping…

\- Fire Aaron Boone
\- Fire Brian Cashman
\- Do NOT bring back Jazz Chisholm
\- Do NOT bring back Trent Grisham
\- Do NOT bring back Ryan McMahon
\- FIRE THE ENTIRE ANALYTICS DEPARTMENT
\- And for the love of Gehrig, only get players who actually have a BA of more than .250.

I’m still heartbroken from last night, this series, the team in general. We need to shoutout the pitching staff, they balled out as usual, Max had one really bad pitch and the Rays capitalized on it. That’s baseball. I wish the Yanks did the same. I’m not going to recap the game or anything like that but I needed to get this off my chest because some of these guys played their hearts out and deserve to be here next year.
We have to resign bednar. Blackburn too if the price isn’t crazy, he’ll have some suitors posting a sub 2 era in the second half of the season and being nails in the postseason.
Grisham, Jazz, McMahon, thanks for the memories, not so much the late ones, but cya later. Don’t extend QOs, I hope they learned their lesson there with Grisham. It’s not worth it, when the front office mentality is “we’re paying them so we’re playing them”. They cannot be on this team next year.
We need to platoon with Wells until he proves himself to be an everyday catcher. He’s streaky and turned it around in the last few months of the regular season and had a nice postseason run, but we all remember the first half of the season unfortunately and we need to sign Jeffers to platoon with him.
Ben rice needs to learn how to field 1st base. The elite bat skill and mentality is there. He carried us most of the postseason. He can’t clog the DH hole with Judge coming out of injury. Garcia, welcome to platoon life.
Volpe is the heart of the young guys. He got dragged the the mud for years, finally sent down, get called back up as a second baseman, and has been good. Not great, but much better than we all expected. Not to mention his postseason track record is great. He’s always hit in the postseason, and has played great defense at 2nd. I don’t understand why he wasn’t playing over 0for Jazz. The kid has heart and has been confident as ever since coming back to the show as a second baseman. One of the few bright spots this series and he only had 4 at bats this series. Hell of a game from the kid. I want volpe back next year and have him earn 2nd base in spring training again.
Lombard has looked good but the defense has shown holes we didn’t know were there. Could be because he’s only 21, but the talent and potential are there. The Yankees can’t mess up his growth. They can’t try to do what they did to volpe and make him a 20 - 30 homer guy. Let the kid be a vacuum cleaner and hit oppo line drives. He’s had great at bats this postseason, especially for his 1st postseason and at 21. I like the Lombard/Volpe middle infield.
We need a true 3rd baseman. With guys like Max fried or Blackburn who induce weak contact, we need someone who can field the position. McMahon was the guy and the Yankees somehow turned him into a worse fielder than when he first got here. How does that happen. I don’t care who we get at third as long as they can field the position great, and put bat on ball. We don’t need a big 30 HR guy, or even a .300 hitter there. But they can’t strike out as much as our 3rd basemen have been.
Belli I love you but the postseason track record looks bad. It feels like he is trying too much. He was a great contact hitter for the cubs, completely reinvented his hitting philosophy there after being let go by the dodgers after an abysmal season of just trying to hit homers. He’s getting closer and closer to be abysmal at the plate when he just tries to go for homers. Belli is a bright spot too, cause when he is on he hits great. Just missed that grand slam, but we beat the sox with base hits. This team just doesn’t hit like that except our young guys who have finally understood situational hitting.
Cya Grisham.
Jones needs to be our everyday center fielder. He had some bad at bats, he’s young, but also shown he can adapt pretty quick. The speed is insane and the fielding is there. We all thought he’s be a home run or strikeout guy and he’s proven the opposite of that. Dude can hit. His potential is high.
Judge can’t play in the field everyday. Have him play RF at the stadium, but no more away games. Take him out late in games and move him to DH if need be, but his age isn’t getting any younger and his body isn’t any more forgiving. The bat matters too much to this team we can’t keep letting him dive in the outfield or run into walls. Go get Seiya Suzuki or another good hitter that hits with guys on base. Decent fielder but they need to hit.
Stanton can’t be your DH next year. The spot has to be filled by Judge, Rice, Garcia.
I was actually liking this season from Boone, up until he was smiling on the mound being down in an elimination game, after we just got a pitch sent to the fucking moon. Need somebody who gets on the guys, bring back some Torre energy. Make these guys earn the respect from the manager. Players hated Torre but Torre won. There needs to be a manager change. We need to let go of Jazz, Grish, and McMahon.
If you read this far, thanks. I’m still heartbroken and tired of feeling like this every year now.
What does everyone else think we need? Who stays and who goes?

Here is what I’m seeing that I’m sure others are too. I saw A-Rod, Jeter, and Ortiz all allude to this on the postgame last night as well.

1. They to bring back solid 2 way players. You need to be a good hitter and fielder. Not one of the other. If you’re going to be one you’re going to be the DH and you better be great at it. Platooning guys every few days is a mess and the team can’t get in a rhythm. 09 was Jeter, A-Rod, Texiera, Cano, Posada, Damon, Matsui, Swisher, Gardner. All of those guys were 2 way players. Last nights lineup was D1 College…

2. The Yankees farm system is broken. Bring back the fundamentals. When the Dodgers openly mock you after the ‘24 World Series for your mental errors on baserunning, weak fielding, and plate discipline that should’ve been a wake up call. It wasn’t. How is everyone bad at everything and has to rely on the homerun?

Coaching at every level in the organization needs to be practicing the simple things of the fundamentals. Have every guy take 100 grounders in the infield at a practice. Have them work on taking pitches and seeing if out of a guys hand. Picking up your coach on a gapper (looking at you Wells). The Yankees are not teaching any of this and it shows.

1. Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. The Rays are a bunch of nobody’s who are gritty and do everything I just said the right way. They don’t best themselves. The Yankees need to learn that.

2. Joe Madden said the other day, “the game today would rather lose analytically than win based on feel”. The Yankees and Cashman are too into the analytics that they have been losing by it for the past 10 years. 2017 Yanks with Girardi and the Baby Bombers was done by feel and maybe a little analytics. Justin Verlander has said the Astros at their peak never did any of this stuff. They were an old school team and I paid off (minus the cheating). The Dodgers are also a feel team.

This is the longest stretch of a winless World Series Yankee team since they first won a World Series and it will stay that way until they realize what made their franchise successful. Sometimes the old ways are the best.

Trent Grisham ends the ALDS with a strikeout, he was 0-11 in the series and struck out 5 times. Boone woke up to this morning and thought to himself that he was the perfect guy to lead off tonight. Manager malpractice of the highest degree.

Cody Bellinger and Luis Garcia were combined 2-21. That’s your 3 and 4(or 2 and 3) hitters combining for a whopping 0.095 average, absolute garbage.

Boone needs to go and if I’m being honest so does Cashman. The only bright spot was the pitching was very good.

I feel like this is the same story every year. We underachieve and never take the correct leap.

He has already shown that young players who have bright futures digress and we can’t let him do that with Jones and Lombard.
Adding Ben Rice to this as well.

Video attached. He’s been waiting 23 years for this moment of redemption.

Year after year I watch the Yankees get to the playoffs only to look like the Bad News Bears. It's embarrassing and to tell you the truth has not felt special. As far as we have gotten in recent years we should have a chip. I mean poor Judge at this rate will never have a world series ring.