1999 American League Championship Series
Team (Wins) Managers Season New York Yankees (4) Joe Torre 98–64, .605, GA: 4 Boston Red Sox (1) Jimy Williams 94–68, .580, GB: 4
Dates	October 13–18
MVP	Orlando Hernández (New York)
Umpires	Tim McClelland Dan Morrison Rick Reed Al Clark Dale Scott Tim Tschida
Broadcast
Television	Fox
TV announcers	Joe Buck,Tim McCarver andBob Brenly
Radio	ESPN
Radio announcers	Ernie Harwell andRick Sutcliffe
ALDS	New York Yankees overTexas Rangers (3–0) Boston Red Sox overCleveland Indians (3–2)
← 1998 ALCS 2000 →

The1999American League Championship Series (ALCS) was a semifinal matchup inMajor League Baseball's1999 postseason between the East Division Champion and top-seededNew York Yankees (98–64) and the Wild CardBoston Red Sox (94–68). The Yankees had advanced to the Series after sweeping the West Division ChampionTexas Rangers in theAL Division Series for the second consecutive year, and the Red Sox advanced by beating the Central Division ChampionCleveland Indians three games to two. The Yankees won the series, 4-1. They won their 36th American League pennant and went on to win theWorld Series against the Atlanta Braves.

Both teams came into the series on a roll; New York had swept theTexas Rangers for the second straight year in the1999 American League Division Series and Boston had come from two games down to defeat theCleveland Indians in their division series.

New York won the series, 4–1.

Wednesday, October 13, 1999, atYankee Stadium (I) inBronx, New York

Before the 1999 ALCS,Yogi Berra famously tookBernie Williams aside, smiled, and offered a word of advice for Williams, who was admittedly nervous before the start of the series between the two rivals: "Relax. We’ve been beating these guys for 80 years."^[6]

Game 1 was a matchup betweenKent Mercker andOrlando Hernández. Hernández, the soon-to-be-named ALCS MVP, got into trouble in the first two innings. In the first, after a leadoff single byJosé Offerman,John Valentin reached on an error byDerek Jeter, scoring Offerman for the first run of the game. Valentin then scored onBrian Daubach's single to right. It looked like the Red Sox were ready to clobber the Yankees, but no more runs would score in the inning. In the top of the second,Darren Lewis scored on an infield hit to give Boston a 3-0 lead, but the Yankees' resilience showed itself in the bottom of the inning. WithShane Spencer on first with two out,Scott Brosius slugged a home run to make it a one-run game. The duel continued into the seventh when, withDerek Lowe pitching, Brosius singled to lead off the inning. A sacrifice bunt byChuck Knoblauch moved him into scoring position. Jeter singled to center driving in Brosius to tie the game, but the score would remain knotted after nine full innings.

In the top of the 10th, with the Red Sox batting order turned over and Yankees closerMariano Rivera on in relief, a controversial umpiring call thwarted a potential Boston rally. After Jose Offerman led off with a single, John Valentin then hit a hard ground ball which was fielded byScott Brosius, who threw to second to attempt a 6-4-3 double play; however, the error-prone Chuck Knoblauch appeared to have the ball bounce out of his glove. Despite video replays confirming that Knoblauch dropped the throw from Brosius, umpireRick Reed ruled that the ball was dropped on the transfer, and called Offerman out. The next batter,Brian Daubach, grounded into a double play and the side was retired.

In the bottom half of the 10th,Rod Beck came on in relief for the Red Sox and promptly gave up a leadoff homer to Bernie Williams win the game for the Yankees. The Yankees took a 1-0 lead in the series.

Thursday, October 14, 1999, atYankee Stadium (I) inBronx, New York

Game 2 pittedRamón Martínez againstDavid Cone. After grabbing a 1–0 lead behind a solo home run in the fourth inning byTino Martinez, the Red Sox responded in the fifth inning whenJose Offerman hit a leadoff single and two outs later,Nomar Garciaparra homered to put them up 2−1. In the seventh inning,Ricky Ledee drew a leadoff walk, moved to second on a sacrifice bunt, and scored onChuck Knoblauch's double to tie the game.Tom Gordon relieved Martinez and walkedDerek Jeter, thenRhéal Cormier relieved Gordon and allowed a single toPaul O'Neill put the Yankees ahead 3−2. The lead would stand andMariano Rivera, who won Game 1, got the save in the ninth inning to put the Yankees up two games going toFenway Park.

Saturday, October 16, 1999, atFenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts

Game 3 was the long anticipated matchup betweenPedro Martínez andRoger Clemens, but the Red Sox would come out swinging, scoring in all but two innings. After a leadoff triple by Jose Offerman in the first, John Valentin homered to put the Red Sox ahead 2–0. Next inning, Clemens allowed a one-out double toTrot Nixon and subsequent single to Offerman before Valentin's groundout scored Nixon. AfterJason Varitek walked, Nomar Garciaparra's double scored Offerman to make it 4−0. Clemens was done in the third inning after allowing a leadoff single toMike Stanley as Red Sox fans chanted "Where is Roger?" and then a response chant of "In the Shower".Hideki Irabu fared worse in relief as Brian Daubach's home run made it 6−0. Daubach andDarren Lewis hit back-to-back leadoff doubles in the fifth and the latter scored on Offerman's single two outs later to make it 8−0. Next inning, Yankees left fielder Ricky Ledee's error on Daubach's fly ball allowedTroy O'Leary to score all the way from first. In the seventh, Nixon hit a leadoff single, moved to second on a groundout, and scored on Valetin's single. One out later, Garciaparra's home run made it 12−0. O'Leary then doubled to left and scored Boston's last run on Stanley's single. Martinez, for his part, pitched brilliantly, striking out 12 Yankees in seven scoreless innings and allowing just two hits. He would finish 1999 with a streak of 17 scoreless innings in the playoffs. The Yankees scored their only run on Scott Brosius's home run off of Tom Gordon in the eighth. The Red Sox would go on to win 13–1 and make the series two games to one. Boston's victory also snapped a 10-game losing streak in LCS games dating back to 1988 which remains the longest such streak in MLB history to this day.

Sunday, October 17, 1999, atFenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts

Game 4 pittedAndy Pettitte againstBret Saberhagen, and just as they had in Game 1, the Red Sox would once again find themselves at odds with the umpire crew over some questionable calls. The Yankees struck first in the top of the 2nd, whenDarryl Strawberry, in his first at-bat, hit a home run to silence the crowd chants of "Darryl! Darryl!" and "Just say no!" The Red Sox tied it in the bottom half whenButch Huskey doubled with one out and scored onTroy O'Leary's single. In the bottom of the third,Damon Buford hit a one-out single, stole second and scored onJose Offerman's single to put the Red Sox ahead 2–1. However, those were the only runs Pettitte allowed in 7 1/3 strong innings. In the fourth,Bernie Williams singled with one out, reaching second on an error, before scoring onTino Martinez's double to tie the game. AfterDarryl Strawberry was intentionally walked andScott Brosius struck out, another error onChad Curtis's ground ball allowed Martinez to score to put the Yankees up 3−2. That was all the runs allowed by Saberhagen in six innings. The score remained the same until the Yankees blew the game open with six runs in the ninth off the Boston bullpen.Chuck Knoblauch andDerek Jeter hit back-to-back one out singles off ofRich Garces, then an errant throw on Paul O'Neill's ground ball allowed Knoblauch to score. Williams's single scored Jeter before Martinez was intentionally walked.Rod Beck relieved Garces and allowed a grand slam toRicky Ledée to cap the scoring at 9−2. The Yankees were one win away from the World Series.

This game featured the infamous trash throwing incident by fans when Jimy Williams was ejected from the game after arguing when Nomar Garciaparra was called out at first in the ninth inning. This followed a blown call by umpireTim Tschida onChuck Knoblauch's tag attempt onJosé Offerman in the eighth inning.^[7] The blown call is now famously referred to as "The Phantom Tag".^[8]

Monday, October 18, 1999, atFenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts

Game 5 was a rematch between Mercker and Hernandez. Chuck Knoblauch singled to lead off the first and Jeter followed with a home run to put the Yankees up for good. They added to their lead in the seventh when Jeter reached second on an error and moved to third on Paul O'Neill's single off of Derek Lowe. Rhéal Cormier walked Bernie Williams to load the bases and another error onChili Davis's ground ball allowed Jeter to score before Tino Martinez's RBI single made it 4−0 Yankees. El Duque kept the Red Sox in check, allowing only one run on a homer byJason Varitek in the eighth. The Yankees added insurance in the ninth on Jorge Posada's two-run home run off of Tom Gordon. Both teams left eleven men on base and the Yankees would go on to win the pennant.

1999 ALCS(4–1):New York Yankees overBoston Red Sox

In quite possibility the climax season of theYankees dynasty, they swept the Braves in theWorld Series, winning their third World Series in four seasons. Their game three blow out loss to the Red Sox in this series was their only loss of the entire 1999 postseason. The Yankees would win anotherWorld Series in 2000, making it four championships in five seasons. The only other team to match the 1999 Yankees one loss record in a single postseason in the Wild Card era was the2005 Chicago White Sox, who also won 11 games and lost once.

After the season,Pedro Martinez was beaten out for the1999 American League Most Valuable Player Award by Rangers’ catcherIvan Rodriguez due to being left off the ballot of two voters completely by Minneapolis’ LaVelle Neal and New York’s George King. In both their explanations, Neal and King believed that starting pitchers should not be considered for the Most Valuable Player as they only pitched once every 4–5 days. However, in King’s case, his point proved be contradictory. In the previous season, King had put two starting pitchers on his MVP ballot, the Yankees’David Wells and the Texas Rangers’Rick Helling. In addition, King’s vote for Helling was the only vote Helling received for the MVP, as he went 20-7 with a 4.41 ERA, 1.37WHIP and 162 strikeouts, a much inferior pitching stat line compared to Martinez's 1999 season. King later noted that he had a talk with friend after the 1998 MVP who convinced him that his earlier MVP votes were off base and that he should no longer vote for pitchers;^[9] however, many fans in Boston felt like it was a New York reporter sticking it to a Boston player.^[10][11]

Nevertheless, Pedro was spectacular in 1999, pitching to a 2.07 ERA to go with 313 strikeouts in 213 innings pitched. He pitched even better in 2000, but only placed 5th in MVP voting that season. His 1999-2000 seasons are widely considered two of the best pitched seasons in the modern era.^[12][13]Justin Verlander in2011 was the first pitcher to win a MVP sinceRoger Clemens in1986. Three years later,Clayton Kershaw became the first pitcher in the National League to win the MVP sinceBob Gibson in1968. A pure pitcher has not won the MVP since Kershaw in 2014 -Shohei Ohtani, atwo-way player, has won it several times.

In 1999, the Red Sox were no match for the Yankees, as no team in baseball was during this era. However, withnew ownership that allowed them to spend close to the Yankees in payroll, the Red Sox would be considered equals to the Yankees by 2003. This was seen in two classic postseason series in2003 and2004. In the 2003 American League Championship Series, the Yankees beat the Red Sox on a game seven walk-off byAaron Boone home run in the 11th inning. Red Sox fans called Boone "Aaron Fucking Boone," much as they called Bucky Dent "Bucky Fucking Dent."^[14] In the 2004 American League Championship Series between thetwo rivals, the Red Sox would break through in dramatic fashion, becoming the first team in baseball history to comeback from a3-0 deficit to win a post-season series. Boston went on to finish the job, sweeping the Cardinals and winning their firstWorld Series since 1918.

The Red Sox and Yankees have played three more times in the postseason since 2004, with Boston winning the2018 American League Division Series and the2021 American League Wild Card Game and the Yankees winning the2025 American League Wild Card Series.

• 1999 ALCS at Baseball Reference

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