Getty Gerrit Cole of the New York Yankees.
Two of the top aces in the American League will take the mound as the No. 5 New York Yankees and No. 4 Cleveland Indians kick off their Wild Card Series on Tuesday.
Games 1 and 2 will be televised on ESPN, and Game 3 will be on an ESPN network. But if you don’t have cable, here’s how to watch a live stream of every Yankees vs Indians wild-card game online for free:
Heavy may earn an affiliate commission if you sign up via a link on this page
FuboTV
You can watch a live stream of ESPN, ESPN2 and 100-plus other TV channels on FuboTV, which you can use for free with a seven-day trial right here:
Once signed up for FuboTV, you can watch the Yankees vs Indians live on the FuboTV app, which is available on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV, Android TV, iPhone, Android phone, iPad or Android tablet. Or you can watch on your computer via the FuboTV website.
You can also watch the games live via ESPN.com or the ESPN app. You’ll need to sign in to a TV provider to watch this way, but you can use your Fubo credentials to do that.
If you can’t watch live, FuboTV comes with 250 hours of cloud DVR space.
Vidgo
You can watch a live stream of ESPN, ESPN2 and 65+ other TV channels on Vidgo, which you can use for free with a seven-day trial:
Once signed up for Vidgo, you can watch the Yankees vs Indians live on the Vidgo app, which is available on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Android TV, iPhone, Android phone, iPad or Android tablet. Or you can watch on your computer via the Vidgo website.
You can also watch the games live via ESPN.com or the ESPN app. You’ll need to sign in to a TV provider to watch this way, but you can use your Vidgo credentials to do that.
Sling TV
You can watch a live stream of ESPN, ESPN2 and 30-plus other TV channels via Sling TV’s “Sling Orange” bundle. It comes with a free three-day trial, but if you bypass that, you can get it for $20 for the first month (normally $30), and get Showtime, Starz, and Epix included for free:
Once signed up for Sling TV, you can watch the Yankees vs Indians live on the Sling TV app, which is available on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV, or Firestick, Apple TV, Chromecast, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV, LG Smart TV, Android TV, airTV Mini, Oculus, Portal, iPhone, Android phone, iPad, or Android tablet. Or you can watch on your computer via the Sling TV website.
You can also watch the games live via ESPN.com or the ESPN app. You’ll need to sign in to a TV provider to watch this way, but you can use your Sling credentials to do that.
If you can’t watch live, Sling TV comes included with 10 hours of cloud DVR.
Hulu With Live TV
You can watch a live stream of ESPN, ESPN2 and 65+ other TV channels via Hulu With Live TV, which you can try out for free with a seven-day trial:
Once signed up for Hulu With Live TV, you can watch the Yankees vs Indians live on the Hulu app, which is available on your Roku, Roku TV, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Samsung Smart TV, LG Smart TV, Android TV, iPhone, Android phone, iPad or Android tablet. Or you can watch on your computer via the Hulu website.
You can also watch the games live via ESPN.com or the ESPN app. You’ll need to sign in to a TV provider to watch this way, but you can use your Hulu credentials to do that.
If you can’t watch live, Hulu with Live TV also comes with 50 hours of Cloud DVR storage (with the ability to upgrade to “Enhanced Cloud DVR,” which gives you 200 hours of DVR space and the ability to fast forward through commercials).
Yankees vs Indians Preview
It went down to the wire for the Indians, but Cleveland is hosting its Wild Card Series against the New York Yankees thanks to a thrilling comeback win against the Pirates in their regular season finale. Cleveland was 18-12 at home this season.
“We feel proud of our city and we wanted to play here,” Indians DH Franmil Reyes told reporters after the win. “We want to give the city of Cleveland what they deserve, which is to keep winning and a championship.”
The Indians enter the postseason on a hot streak, having won nine of their last 11 games. Cleveland ace Shane Bieber will get the ball for Game 1, coming off a season where he led the MLB in ERA (1.63) and strikeouts (122).
“He has really taken another step from what was an amazing year for him last year,” New York manager Aaron Boone said. “We also love that challenge. You love the opportunity to compete against the best. We’ll put together a game plan and hopefully be able to go out and ding him a little bit.”
But Bieber and the Indians will have their hands full with a power Yankees lineup that features AL batting champ DJ LeMahieu and MLB home run leader Luke Voit.
“A couple guys you got to be careful with,” Bieber said. “There’s obviously some real good talent and some good bat-to-ball with DJ LeMahieu and there’s some obvious power in that lineup.”
The Yankees are turning to ace Gerrit Cole — their crown jewel of the offseason — to start the series. He proved to be worth nearly every dollar of his $324 million deal this season, leading the Yankees in wins, starts, innings, complete games and strikeouts.
“Whether I was getting paid what I’m getting paid, or pitching for the team I’m playing for now, I take the same approach every time I go out there,” Cole said. “It is what it is, and I just try to go out there and do my job.”
The Yankees lost six of their final eight contests but feel like they can make a run.
“We haven’t in my opinion played up to our ability recently, but I think that for the most part we got the majority of our guys healthy and on the field and got some guys back in the lineup at the right time and hopefully starting Tuesday going on a roll,” Yankees outfielder Brett Gardner said.