A Yankees' triple play.

Triple plays remain pretty rare in Major League Baseball, but the New York Yankees have now pulled off two inside a month. On May 21, they got out of some ninth-inning trouble at home against the Chicago White Sox with a 5-4-3  triple play. On Thursday, they recorded a 1-3-6-2-5-6 triple play (the first one in MLB history, as per Sportsnet) against the Toronto Blue Jays in the bottom of the first:

That’s a pretty crazy triple play, and one made possible by the Blue Jays’ basepath blunders. This started with runners on third and second (following a Marcus Semien walk, a Bo Bichette single, and a wild pitch from pitcher Michael King), so neither of them had to try to advance on what looked like an easy out, with King fielding a Vladimir Guerrero Jr. grounder and throwing to DJ LeMahieu at first. And Semien looked like he was only checking the waters, going a short ways off third and then retreating towards the bag. But Bichette came running all the way in from second, forcing Semien to reverse course and go for home, but Bichette also retreated back towards second.

That led to LeMahieu firing to shortstop Gleyber Torres at second, forcing Bichette to head back towards third. Torres then threw to catcher Gary Sanchez, who then ran up the line and threw to third baseman Gio Urshela, who was advancing the other way. Urshela made the tag on Semien for the second out, and it might have ended there if Bichette had just gone back to second after Torres’ throw to Sanchez. But he eventually did decide to go for third, and when he got there, it was too late; after putting the tag on Semien, Urshela threw to Torres, who made the tag at third. The Jays wound up challenging the tag call, but it was upheld. So that let this remarkable triple play stand.

[MLB on Twitter]

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.