3 concerns that remain despite Yankees advancing to face Blue Jays in ALDS

October baseball will continue in New York. After vanquishing the Boston Red Sox, the New York Yankees are one step closer to the ultimate goal of claiming their 28th World Series title. Before they get ahead of themselves, they'll have to take down another division rival, the Toronto Blue Jays.

The way Game 3 played out should have many riding high. The world watched as Cam Schlittler dominated Boston's lineup, while the offense (and Boston's horrid defense) did enough to take care of rookie Connelly Early and emerge with a 4-0 victory.

The team looked strong, but despite that, concerns remain. The Yankees will need to hope that these issues can be held in check against the Blue Jays; otherwise, they'll be going home much earlier than they'd like.

These three Yankees concerns still remain as they prepare to take on the Blue Jays

The bullpen, specifically the bridge to David Bednar

The biggest red flag that can prematurely end the Yankees' October run is the bullpen. Though the unit was better over the season's final two weeks, improving somewhat from a league-worst low point after it was allegedly fixed at the trade deadline, the unit's 4.74 ERA from August 1 until the season's end was pretty grotesque.

In Game 1, the instability of Yankee relievers reared its ugly head, and even when they were able to escape trouble in Game 2, you'd prefer not to see 400-foot rockets being given up as a means to get out of jams.

The bridge to David Bednar is shaky at best, and even while Bednar's been mostly good, he's not making anyone forget about Mariano Rivera when he takes the ball in the ninth.

The Yankees have brand names and talent out there. That's the good news. If they start living up to their past reputations, things will look a lot brighter.

Aaron Judge finally rising to the moment in the postseason

Aaron Judge didn't have a bad series against the Red Sox, but he also didn't turn in the type of performance that silences the whispers of his detractors. Judge finished the series with four hits in 11 at-bats; all four hits were singles.

Judge did play a role in getting the Game 1 rally against Aroldis Chapman started with a single to set up the Yankees for an eventual bases-loaded opportunity that they squandered, but if he's going to change his postseason narrative, he'll need to do more than simply set the table.

Believing in the Yankees means believing that Judge will finally have his signature postseason moment. Until that happens, his .212 batting average and 32.1% strikeout rate in October are all that matter, and a handful of (mostly hard-hit) singles isn't enough to change that. The Yankees have a deep and powerful lineup, but Judge is the engine that makes it go. Another poor showing and the Yankees will be going home, and the concerns about the Captain in the playoffs will only grow.

Managerial malfeasance

Aaron Boone made a plethora of key managerial blunders in Game 1. Often a slave to the conventional wisdom that the numbers provide, he often doesn't look at the context of the individual matchup, nor does he seem to have the pulse of a particular moment.

For example, pulling Max Fried with one out in the seventh was Boone playing the matchups. Fried is a lefty, and Ceddanne Rafaela bats righty, so conventional wisdom says you pull the southpaw for a right-handed reliever in order to take advantage of the platoon matchup.

However, that blind faith in the data ignored the context of that particular matchup. Rafaela actually hit worse against lefties in 2025, while Fried had (slightly) better numbers against right-handed hitters than left-handed ones. On top of that, the reliever he called upon, Luke Weaver, had just posted a 9.64 ERA in the month of September and was a big part of the bullpen's struggles mentioned above.

Of course, that wasn't Boone's only questionable decision. The lineup card he wrote left 57 homers on the bench to start the game. His decision to pinch hit for the righty reserves he gave starts to meant he had no right-handed pinch-hitters to call upon as lefty flamethrower Aroldis Chapman took the hill to close out the proceedings.

The subsequent games were better, but in what was nearly an overcorrection from pulling Fried, he left Rodon in to get into a jam after it was clear the starter was gassed and had lost the strike zone. The Yankees were fortunate to escape that unscathed.

Boone's managerial prowess has been under fire for some time now. He'll need to avoid his common missteps against Toronto, or else things will end poorly.