Yankees swept by Astros in ALCS as costly error dooms Game 4

In the end, the Yankees didn’t slay the dragon. 

Instead, the Astros chewed them up and spit them out, completing a four-game sweep in the ALCS with a 6-5 win on Sunday night in The Bronx, as the Yankees saw another season end without a World Series appearance. 

And for the third time in six years, the Astros ended the Yankees’ season in the ALCS. 

“They beat us, and we end up second in the American League,’’ Aaron Boone said. “We’ve got to keep working to get better.” 

On a chilly night at the Stadium, which wasn’t sold out, the Yankees wasted an early three-run lead, saw Nestor Cortes leave in the third inning with a groin injury and watched Gleyber Torres make a key error in the seventh that led to a pair of runs, as the Astros took the lead for good on Alex Bregman’s one-out, run-scoring single off Clay Holmes. 

It ended with Aaron Judge, in perhaps his final at-bat as a Yankee, ending his miserable postseason with a grounder back to Ryan Pressly for the final out. 

“If we’re not the last team standing, it doesn’t matter what you do or what happened,” Judge said. “It’s a failure. We came up short.” 

Judge said he had yet to think about his free-agent future. 

Boone added, “I don’t even want to think about” the team without Judge. 

The Yankees didn’t get a hit after Harrison Bader’s sixth-inning homer that gave them a 5-4 lead. 

The loss came to an Astros team that has eliminated the Yankees in all four of their playoff meetings. 

And it came after Boone said after the Yankees were swept in a doubleheader in Houston on July 21 that it would all come down to what happened in the playoffs. 

“Ultimately, we may have to slay the dragon, right?” Boone said. “If it comes to it in October, the proof will be in the pudding. Do we get it done?” 

They got their answer Sunday. 

“They beat us in every facet,’’ Gerrit Cole said. “I watched the series and didn’t really see an area where we played better than them.” 

Boone and Co. were left pondering what would have happened if DJ LeMahieu and Andrew Benintendi were healthy, but it’s clear the Yankees are rattled by their inability to beat Houston. 

“That’s a good question for all of us this offseason,’’ LeMahieu said of closing the gap on Houston. “They’re really good.” 

Now, the Yankees must face an offseason in which the future of Judge is unclear, with the right fielder potentially headed to free agency for the first time, as well as general manager Brian Cashman having his contract expire. 

The Yankees had hoped to extend the series and seemed set up to do so, at least for one more game. 

After Cortes pitched a scoreless first, the Yankees took a rare lead in the bottom half. 

Bader’s torrid postseason continued when he led off with a single. 

Anthony Rizzo was hit by a pitch by Lance McCullers Jr. and Giancarlo Stanton put the Yankees ahead with a single to right-center, as they snapped a 14-inning scoreless streak. 

Torres came up with runners on the corner and blooped a single to center to drive in Rizzo to make it 2-0. 

Isiah Kiner-Falefa led off the second with a double down the right-field line. With two outs, Rizzo poked an opposite-field double to left to drive in Kiner-Falefa and make it 3-0. 

Cortes, however, lacked his typical command and went to three ball counts on five of the first nine batters. 

With Cortes’ velocity down in the third and Jose Altuve at the plate following a leadoff walk to Martin Maldonado, Boone went to the mound with trainer Tim Lentych. 

Cortes remained in the game and walked Altuve. 

Jeremy Peña then hammered a three-run shot to left to tie the game at 3-3. 

Boone went back to the mound with Lentych and Cortes left with a groin injury, replaced by Wandy Peralta. 

Peralta immediately gave up a double to Yordan Alvarez. 

Yuli Gurriel’s chopper through the right side of the infield left vacant by the shift went for an RBI single to give the Astros a 4-3 lead. 

A Rizzo RBI single in the fourth tied the game again. 

Bader gave the Yankees another lead in the sixth with a two-out solo homer off Hector Neris. It was Bader’s fifth home run of the postseason. 

Jonathan Loaisiga cruised through 2 ¹/₃ innings before Altuve reached on an infield hit with one out in the seventh. 

Altuve moved to second after Peña grounded to second and Torres rushed his toss to Kiner-Falefa at second for an error on what could have been an inning-ending double play. 

With runners on first and second, Alvarez singled to right to knock in Altuve and tie the game, knocking out Loaisiga. 

Holmes entered and gave up a flare single to Bregman to put Houston ahead, 6-5. 

The Astros will head to the World Series for the fourth time in seven years and will face the Phillies.