NEW YORK — With Aaron Judge in the building, there’s always a chance for fireworks.

Yet little of the New York Yankees’ performance over six-plus innings of a 6-2 victory on Tuesday could be described as explosive. The hosts, leading 4-2 over the Cleveland Guardians in the seventh inning of ALCS Game 2, played well enough to win, yet poorly enough to worry the 47,054 souls gathered in the Bronx on a brisk evening. to make.

Top pitcher Gerrit Cole was more boring than a bad documentary and walked four batters over 4 1/3 tough innings. The Yankees, who were the league’s worst baserunning team during the regular season, encountered a few outs on the basepaths. It was a B+ performance at best.

Sure, there were checks, goals were scored — nitpicking about an October win almost feels reductive — but few would have been overjoyed with how the Yankees showed up in the first two games of this ALCS. The ultimate goal – for every team and this team in particular – is a World Series title. But for sixteen innings, that destination somehow didn’t feel much closer. The story: These Yankees were a rickety gold wagon that trudged forward and clawed its way to the World Series.

Then Aaron Judge, as he so often does, rewrote the story.

With a single wave, Judge changed the mood, changed the energy and put his teammates and the crowd at ease. For the 14th time in his playoff career, the Goliathan slugger disappeared a baseball. His two-run shot hung in the air for an extra strike as the crowd hoped, cheered and wanted the ball over the wall.

Cleveland midfielder Lane Thomas gave a fruitless chase. The white blur disappeared from view, giving the Yankees a much nicer 6-2 lead. The garden exploded and exhaled in one breath.

“I was excited for it to go out,” Judge said in his postgame chat. “You never know on these windy, cold nights what that ball is going to do when you hit downtown here, but the spirits moved there to Monument Park, that’s for sure.”

Before Judge’s swing, the Yankees were leading but not in control.

That was despite scoring three early points against Cleveland starter Tanner Bibee, who was retired after four outs. In the second inning, Guardians manager Stephen Vogt intentionally walked Juan Soto to face Aaron Judge, marking only the third time ever that the batter was given a free trip to first ahead of Judge. Judge followed with a sac-bunt.

Yet there was still a certain…stuck neutral feeling permeating the chilly autumn air. Maybe it was just due to a bad night from Cole.

“I just have to try harder. I have to do better,” the frustrated pitcher admitted after the game.

Cleveland worked some long at-bats against Cole early, even though the Yankees starter finished his first three innings scoreless. He got into foul trouble in the fourth, but Cleveland failed to capitalize.

After three runs, the Guardians loaded the bases with a pair of singles and a walk. That brought light-hitting catcher Bo Naylor to the plate with only one out. Cole looked rickety; the crowd grew increasingly anxious.

And so Vogt took his chance. The freshman skipper called Naylor back and opted to use his best pinch-hitting option, right-hander David Fry, in the early innings. It was a wise decision given the situation and Naylor’s recent offensive struggles. There are only so many opportunities against a pitcher like Cole. If someone knocks, you have to kick in the door.

But Fry – who delivered the crucial home run in Cleveland’s ALDS Game 4 win – didn’t deliver this time. Instead, he threw the first pitch, a 97-mph fastball to the corner, for a deflating second out. The next batter, Brayan Rocchio, struck out looking at a borderline call to end a nine-pitch battle. Cole and the Yankees got away scot-free.

That aggressive maneuver haunted Cleveland an inning later, when relief catcher Austin Hedges, one of the worst statistical hitters of his generation, showed up in a huge spot as the Guardians threatened. In the fifth, Cleveland had sent Cole back from the game and scored a pair of runs. The bases got loaded with two outs. Hedges, the emotional rock of this Guardians team, struck out swinging.

From that moment on the game progressed sloppily. The Guardians bobbled a ball into the outfield. The Yankees – more specifically Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Anthony Rizzo – ran into a pair of zeros. Cleveland was unable to do much against New York’s impressive bullpen. The night crept toward a forgettable footnote in an otherwise memorable October, until Judge woke everyone up.

Before Tuesday, Judge had received some criticism for his somewhat subpar performance in these playoffs. The Yankees’ winning streak has kept that buzz in check for the most part — Boone wasn’t asked about Judge in the past three pregame media conferences — but with a player this important, the story is always looming. Only more moments like Judge’s in Game 2 will live up to expectations.

Such is life in the Bronx. Having Judge and his cadre of established difference-makers gives the Yankees a decent margin for error – a margin the Guardians don’t have. Cleveland can’t sleepwalk its way through large portions of a ballgame and expect to win, as the team’s efforts in the first two games have shown. Twice in Game 2 the Yankees left the door open, but twice the Guardians banged straight into the door frame.

That said, if the Yankees play this sloppily against the National League challenger, they will certainly end up in defeat. Still, Aaron Boone was adamant after the game that he is pleased with his club’s performance considering the stakes.

“It’s the postseason,” he said. “It’s all about winning.”

Boone is right; when the weather gets colder, this universe transforms from a process-oriented enterprise to a results-oriented enterprise. It’s as encouraging as it is ominous that the Yankees’ offense has thoroughly underperformed so far in October. As the great baseball writer Sam Miller once said, “Every hitter is hot or due.”

Judge and the Yankees are both, somehow.