New York’s Aaron Judge celebrates with teammates after hitting an RBI-single in the bottom of the ninth inning to give the Yankees a 1-0 win over the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday in New York. The Yankees clinched a playoff berth with the win and will face the Red Sox in the wild-card game on Tuesday in Boston. Frank Franklin III/Associated Press
NEW YORK — Aaron Judge drove home the winning run with a one-out single in the ninth inning and the New York Yankees clinched a playoff berth in their final at-bat of the regular season by beating the Tampa Bay Rays 1-0 Sunday.
Yankees shortstop Gio Urshela made a Jeter-esque catch, charging recklessly into the visiting dugout, and New York finished the year 92-70, punching a fifth consecutive postseason ticket after nearly falling into a labyrnth of tiebreaker scenarios.
The Yankees had their bags packed, knowing a loss to the 100-win Rays could send them into one of several potential Game 163s on the road Monday. Instead, they’ll wait until Tuesday to play again in the AL wild-card game against Boston at Fenway Park. Boston beat Washington 7-5 to clinch a berth and home-field advantage in the wild-card game.
Toronto and Seattle were also in contention for the AL wild card on Sunday, but were eliminated when both the Red Sox and Yankees won. Toronto beat Baltimore 12-4, while Seattle lost to the Los Angeles Angels 7-3.
Rougned Odor led off the ninth with a single against Josh Fleming (10-8), just New York’s second hit. Pinch-runner Tyler Wade advanced to second on Gleyber Torres’ flyout to the warning track in center, and Anthony Rizzo moved Wade to third with a one-out single.
Andrew Kittredge came on to face Judge, who ripped a 104.4 mph line drive off the right-hander’s glove. The ball skipped toward drawn-in second baseman Brandon Lowe, whose off-balance throw home wasn’t nearly in time to catch a sliding Wade.
BLUE JAYS 12, ORIOLES 4: George Springer hit two home runs, including a grand slam, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. launched his 48th homer as Toronto romped to a 12-4 blowout of Baltimore in Toronto, but it wasn’t enough to avoid playoff elimination.
Toronto needed to win, and a loss by the Yankees or Red Sox on the final day of the regular season to force at least a tiebreaker game Monday for an AL wild-card spot. But the Blue Jays’ hopes were dashed when Boston rallied from a four-run deficit to beat Washington 7-5 on a two-run homer by Rafael Devers in the top of the ninth inning that silenced stunned Toronto fans at Rogers Centre who stuck around to watch on the big video board.
A little earlier, New York edged Tampa Bay 1-0 with a run in the bottom of the ninth to clinch a postseason berth.
Hyun Jin Ryu (14-10) pitched five innings to win for the first time since Sept. 6, Marcus Semien hit a solo home run and Tesocar Hernández had three hits and three RBI as the Blue Jays scored in each of the first five innings.
NATIONAL LEAGUE
GIANTS 11, PADRES 4: San Francisco finally won the NL West without needing to wait for the rival Dodgers’ result on the season’s final day, pounding visiting San Diego for a franchise-record 107th victory to top the 1904 New York team.
Logan Webb did it all in leading surprising San Francisco to its first division crown since 2012, delighting a delirious, deafening crowd of 36,901. Buster Posey had an incredible day, too.
Posey raised both arms into the air when Eric Hosmer struck out swinging to end it, and ran out to the mound to hug reliever Dominic Leone.
“The first thing that comes to mind for me is how proud I am of this group and what they accomplished,” Giants Manager Gabe Kapler told fans from the field. “Part of the reason that I feel that way is because I think we all knew at the beginning of the season, or even dating back to the beginning of spring training, what the projections are and what the industry sort of thought of us as a club. What I realized is there are some intangibles that those projections and viewpoints failed to take into consideration.”
Webb walked off to a roaring standing ovation when replaced in the eighth after allowing three straight singles. He struck out eight and didn’t walk a batter while pitching seven-plus stellar innings, and also hit a two-run homer in the fifth to clear the fences for his first time in his career — a pretty line drive to left.
Posey drove in three runs on a pair of singles and got his 1,500th career hit as San Francisco’s division hopes came down to the final day. The Giants clinched the title in Game 162 after losing 3-2 in 10 innings a day earlier as Los Angeles won at night against NL Central champion Milwaukee.
The Giants will host the winner of Wednesday night’s wild-card game between the Dodgers and Cardinals in Game 1 of an NL Division Series on Friday at Oracle Park.
DODGERS 10, BREWERS 3: Trea Turner ended the regular season with a bang, hitting his second grand slam in less than 48 hours to easily wrap up the NL batting title.
“Any time you can win anything in this league, it’s special,” he said. “It’s pretty cool and proud of it.”
The Dodgers came up just short in their bid to unseat the rival San Francisco Giants for the NL West title, beating Milwaukee in Los Angeles for their 106th victory only to finish as the winningest second-place team in major league history.
The Dodgers’ streak of eight straight NL West titles ended with them one game behind the Giants, who beat San Diego 11-4 for their 107th victory.
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