[Thursday’s wild-card schedule | Live blog]
The 2025 MLB playoffs continue on Thursday, as the wild card round concludes with three Game 3s forced courtesy of wins from the Cleveland Guardians, San Diego Padres and New York Yankees on Wednesday.
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The day starts with the Detroit Tigers taking on the Cleveland Guardians for a trip to the ALDS. The Tigers took Game 1, but the Guardians took home Game 2 with a 6-1 rally. With the game tied 1-1 in the bottom of the eighth, Brayan Rocchio started off a five-run inning with a homer to right field, while Bo Naylor all but put the game on ice with a three-run homer for the final score of the game. Jack Flaherty and Slade Cecconi will take the mound for the Tigers and Guardians, respectively, to close out the series.
Next up is Padres-Cubs, where Yu Darvish and Jameson Taillon will take the mound after San Diego walked away with a 3-0 win to keep the series alive on Wednesday. The Padres held the Cubs to a scoreless outing, as the Cubs attempted to hold Manny Machado and company while rotating through six pitchers in this game. They were unsuccessful, giving up two runs to Fernando Tatis Jr. — one of which came on a 416-foot homer to left center.
Finally, another installment of the famous Red Sox-Yankees rivalry will close out the night, with Connelly Early and Cam Schlittler on the mound. After New York’s Jazz Chisholm Jr.’s benching in Game 1, he bounced back in a big way to score the winning run on Wednesday to force Game 3. No doubt, there’s still plenty of action left in the tank.
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The LA Dodgers were the only team to sweep their wild-card series this season, outscoring the Cincinnati Reds 18-9 over the two-game stretch this week to advance to the NLDS, where they’ll face the Philadelphia Phillies. It was a combined effort to come out on top, in part thanks to a dominant run by Mookie Betts, who had a .667 batting average in the two-game series, while Shohei Ohtani and Teoscar Hernandez each had two homers apiece. Blake Snell and Yoshinob Yamamoto did their parts on the mound, each earning a quality start and a win with K/9’s of 11.6 and 12.2, respectively.
No. 6 Detroit Tigers vs. No. 3 Cleveland Guardians, 3:08 p.m. ET on ABC
No. 5 San Diego Padres vs. No. 4 Chicago Cubs, 5:08 p.m. ET on ESPN
No. 5 Boston Red Sox vs. No. 4 New York Yankees, 8:08 p.m. ET on ESPN
MLB wild card Game 3 live blog
Follow along with Yahoo Sports for live updates, highlights and more for the final matchups of the wild-card round: