Ceddanne Rafaela stood at the plate in front of New York Yankees reliever Luke Weaver for what felt like hours. The outfielder swung at a strike, then fouled off pitch after pitch with the bases empty with one out in the top of the seventh inning.
Weaver's 11th pitch zipped past Rafaela wide outside the strike zone, and he took his walk to first base — just his 29th of the year. Rafaela's patience paid off soon, as a double from Nick Sogard advanced him to third base. Sogard's double was a rolling grounder into no man's land in the outfield, but he took an extra base as Aaron Judge fielded the ball and attempted a hard throw with his ailing elbow.
Alex Cora then summoned the red-hot Masataka Yoshida to pinch-hit for Rob Refsnyder. On the first pitch, he drilled a hard single to the right of second base to score the two runners and get the Boston Red Sox on the board, 2-1.
Rafaela isn't known for his eye for the strike zone — his regular season walk rate ranks in just the seventh percentile — but he found yet another way to come in clutch for the Red Sox. From outstanding defense to walk offs to timely walks, Rafaela has delivered when it counts in almost every way this season. His 11-pitch at-bat rattled Weaver and allowed Boston to take the lead over their archrival.
Small ball from Ceddanne Rafaela, Nick Sogard and Masataka Yoshida propelled the Red Sox to Wild Card Game 1 victory over the Yankees
Can't have too many angles of this. pic.twitter.com/bzvAAZnu9e
— Red Sox (@RedSox) October 1, 2025
After stunning performances from Garrett Crochet and Max Fried and an utterly nail-biting ninth inning, Boston emerged victorious, 3-1, in the first game of the Wild Card series. The Red Sox need just one more win to advance to the ALDS to potentially take on the Toronto Blue Jays.
The Red Sox wouldn't have been in a position to take a lead without their ace, Crochet. The lefty surrendered a second-inning solo home run to Anthony Volpe, then retired 17 straight batters until Volpe came to the plate again in the bottom of the eighth inning. Crochet allowed just one run on four hits over 7.2 innings and clocked 11 strikeouts. His 117 pitch outing was the longest of his career.
💯 from Beast. pic.twitter.com/hTZ63ZKojw
— Red Sox (@RedSox) October 1, 2025
Fried was off to a similar night at the plate before he was (prematurely) pulled before Rafaela's heroic free pass. The Yankees' ace posted 6.1 scoreless innings with six strikeouts and three walks, but manager Aaron Boone swapped him out so the righty Weaver could face Rafaela.
Trevor Story and Alex Bregman worked together to add an insurance run in the ninth inning — Story singled and stole second base on a close play, and Bregman doubled to knock him in. The Yankees had a serious run at a comeback in their half of the ninth inning after a frazzled Chapman loaded the bases on three-straight singles. But the closer fanned the deadly Giancarlo Stanton, induced a flyout of Jazz Chisholm Jr., and struck Trent Grisham out to end the game before New York had a chance to respond.
Some risky small ball helped the Red Sox put the Yankees away in Game 1. Since the Wild Card round expanded from one game to a best of three series, the winner of the first game has gone undefeated, each time advancing to the next round. Brayan Bello, a known Yankee killer, will take the mound for Boston on October 1 in hopes of finishing the job.