The Yankees won their wild card series. They fought back, figured it out, and overcame blunders in a wild 10-9 victory over Cleveland that literally began in September and concluded in October.

For all of this, they deserve to celebrate. But they’re trying to win a World Series, not merely the first round. And to that end, this game introduced a significant question: Is their bullpen strong enough to get them through the month?

Were we so busy talking about other Yankee problems this year -- the injuries! The inconsistent offense! Gerrit Cole’s hardly existent mini-slump, even! -- that we failed to notice all the holes in the 'pen.

On Wednesday, this was suddenly impossible to ignore. Needing 15 outs from his relievers after a short start from Masahiro Tanaka, there was nothing Aaron Boone could do to paper over or manage around several painful truths: Tommy Kahnle is badly missed. Adam Ottavino is currently unreliable. Chad Green is not quite what he was a year ago.

Put that all together, and you have Jonathan Loaisiga facing Francisco Lindor in the eighth inning of a tie game in the playoffs. To use a term favored by the analytically-savvy Yankees, this is not the ideal lane for him.

Perhaps over the past few years we’ve come to take a dominant bullpen for granted. Last October, the team hardly needed length from its starters because the pen was so loaded. Green dominated in late innings or as an opener, Kahnle stabilized after a bumpy 2018, and Ottavino’s frisbee slider helped him to cruise through the regular season before running into postseason struggles.

On Wednesday night, Tanaka’s exit after four innings forced a gut check from Boone. It turned out he could only trust Green, Zack Britton and Aroldis Chapman.

Green allowed an RBI double to Jose Ramirez on a curveball, a curious pitch selection. Britton got a big double play but issued two walks in the seventh.

Knowing he needed to replace Britton, Boone went to Loaisiga over Ottavino. We could understand his reluctance. Ottavino struggled in the playoffs last year, and allowed hard contact during this regular season at a rate worse than 98 percent of pitchers in the league.

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