Alexander Wilson
The New York Yankees cannot keep treating David Bednar’s volatility like some tiny inconvenience tucked away in the ninth inning. Not after Sunday. Not after that kind of collapse.
The Yankees led the Mets 6-3 entering the bottom of the ninth and were one out away from escaping Citi Field with a Subway Series win. Bednar entered to finish it, put traffic on, and then gave up a game-tying three-run homer to Tyrone Taylor with two outs. The Mets walked it off in the 10th and stole a 7-6 win.
A loss like that forces an uncomfortable conversation.
Bednar’s line got ugly in a hurry
Before Sunday, the number looked manageable enough on the surface. Bednar was sitting at 19 games, a 1-3 record, a 3.79 ERA, a 1.42 WHIP, and 22 strikeouts over 19 innings. It was not elite closer work, but it was survivable if the ninth inning stayed mostly clean.
The problem is that the ninth inning was not clean, and now the line looks a whole lot worse. After the blown save, Bednar is at 20 games, a 4.95 ERA, 1.55 WHIP, 10 saves, and two blown saves. He allowed three hits, three earned runs, one walk, and the Taylor homer in the inning.
The ERA is one thing. The traffic is the bigger issue. Closers can survive a few crooked numbers over a long season, but they cannot keep turning routine finishes into stress tests when the team has October expectations.
The Yankees need more than blind trust
The Yankees already had a reason to think about a bigger ninth-inning plan, and Bednar could not be the only answer forever. Sunday just made that conversation louder.
The point is not dumping Bednar after one bad pitch. He still misses bats, and the strikeout total is fine. The issue is that the Yankees need a trustworthy finishing plan, not a closer who can look dominant one night and shaky the next. Against the Mets, he had a three-run cushion with two outs and still could not get the final out.
That cannot happen often. It really cannot happen in October.
The Yankees have built too much of this roster around run prevention to have the ninth inning feel unstable. They can survive rotation injuries if the bullpen closes games. They can survive offensive cold stretches if leads hold late. But when a 6-3 ninth-inning lead turns into a 7-6 loss, it exposes the whole operation.
A premium bullpen move should be on the table
The front office does not need to panic, but it does need to be honest. If Bednar is going to stay in the closer mix, the Yankees need another premium arm capable of sharing the finish line.
Call it a true 1-2 punch, call it insurance, call it whatever you want. The point is the same. A team trying to win the American League cannot enter the stretch run with one volatile ninth-inning option and hope the command settles down at exactly the right time.
Sunday was not just a bad loss. It was a warning. The Yankees had the game in hand, the Mets were down to their final out, and Bednar gave it away with one swing.
If that does not push the Yankees toward adding another late-inning weapon, I am not sure what will.
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