Perhaps least discussed among Major League Baseball's new rules aimed at improving the pace of play is the elimination of four comically wide pitches to intentionally run into the manager's four fingers. This change may have saved us a minute per intentional walk, but that doesn't make TV great.

The New York Yankees did their best to give fans what they wanted on Tuesday as New York won 6-3 in the second inning of a game to take a 2-0 lead in the American League Championship Series, like this Cleveland Guardians manager Stephen Vogt executed perhaps the most dramatic intentional walk of the season: one out, runners on second and third, Juan Soto strode to the plate, Aaron Judge lurking in the on-deck circle. Yes, that's right: Vogt went with Soto to take advantage of his chances against probably the American League's most valuable player and AL single-season home run record holder.

“They hit the ball all around the stadium and we had to stop the game,” says Vogt. “In this situation, you want to try to get double-play ball. You want to try to get two outs with one pitch. You want to try to find a way to get out of this inning.”

The TBS cameras captured the reaction in the Yankees' dugout, where first baseman Ben Rice and shortstop Anthony Volpe stared at each other. “There's no way he's doing that now!” Rice whined. Volpe waved his arms. Beside them, third baseman Jazz Chisholm stared up. “I understand Soto is having a great postseason, but you can never calculate the limit,” he says now. The judge's teammates were offended on his behalf.

The judge insists this was not the case.

“He's been swinging the bat well lately, trying to get a double play there and get it out of the inning,” he said. “At this point I’d probably take him for a walk too.”

His teammates aren't buying it.

“He doesn’t take things like that very well,” left fielder Alex Verdugo said.

“I think he meant: OK, I'll show you who I amsays infielder Oswaldo Cabrera. “You can see his body language. You can tell when a man wants that moment.”

“Situations like this motivate everyone,” second baseman Gleyber Torres said. “I think you've woken up, Judge.”

The judge was actually asleep. He was second in the American League Division Series against the Kansas City Royals and went hitless in Game 1 against Cleveland. He has left 15 runners on base and is 0 of 9 runners in scoring position this October.

The Yankees are 5-1 so far this postseason but have yet to face a tough opponent. The Royals' 86-76 record was significantly bolstered by 13 games against the historically terrible White Sox, to whom they lost 12-1; In games against major league level opponents, they maintained a pace of 80 wins. The Guardians can pitch, but have a team-adjusted OPS+ of 99, which is below league average. On Tuesday, the Yankees walked the basepaths with two outs and walked the No. 7 hitter twice on four pitches; If they advance, it's unlikely that this brand of baseball will beat the Los Angeles Dodgers or New York Mets.

Boone has been insisting for days that Judge is one step away from returning to his regular-season style, but his bat hadn't yet proven him right. So Vogt's move made sense. “It takes a lot of courage to take this step,” said first baseman Anthony Rizzo.

It was only the third time in Judge's career that he had faced such humiliation: once in August in a similar situation – with a runner on second with one out – and once in 2016, when he just wasn't very good. In 16 he struck. He hit a home run in August.

Normally Judge has a flair for the dramatic, but in the second case he only managed to hit a fly ball deep enough into center field to score a run.

But two at-bats later, with Torres aboard first base and one out in the seventh, Judge landed a 95-mph four-seamer on the outside edge of the plate, almost at his armpits. It wasn't a bad pitch. It didn't matter. He blasted his first home run of the postseason to center.

The dugout went crazy again, this time with joy. “In these games it really doesn’t matter who it is and how excited we are for everyone, but when Aaron does things it’s really special just because he’s such a special person,” Rizzo said. They teased Torres for pitching in at first base instead of trusting the ball would go out. You breathed out.

Everyone except Chisholm, who just shook his head. “I thought, Damned“, he says with a laugh. “This should have happened (twice) with bats before.”