Aaron Judge is heating up again, adding two more homeruns to fuel the New York Yankees to a road victory over the division rival Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night, as he inches closer to making history.
With his 56th and 57th homer, Judge is four home runs shy of tying Roger Maris’ American League single-season record and is now tied with Alex Rodriguez for the second-most home runs in a season by a right-handed hitter in the AL, trailing Hank Greenberg (1938) and Jimmie Foxx (1932).
It also marked Judge’s 10th multi-homer game of the year, which tied him for third-most in a season in major league history, behind only Sammy Sosa (1998) and Greenberg, with both sluggers clocking 11 in a season.
“You really just don’t look at it. If you’re checking the numbers, you’re gonna get caught,” Judge said, according to ESPN’s Marly Rivera. “I just keep trying to do what I can do, and the numbers will take care of themselves. If I have a good plan and have a good approach, do what I need to do in the box, all that other stuff will show up.”
“I’m out of adjectives. Just really impressive,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said of Judge’s MVP caliber season. “To take one out the other way, and then get Whitlock on a breaking ball, he’s riding balls out so well. Rides the first one out the other way, but then that other one just probably a little bit out in front. Just in such good hitting position and so strong and lays the bat in the zone to ride it out so long that he gets a good piece of it and puts it up in the light stand. Just amazing what he’s doing.”
“I’m sure, deep down, he’s aware of what’s going on. But when your priorities are right, and around team, and around leading this team and being the guy, he keeps it simple,” Boone added. “It’s [about] what I do to help this team win in every aspect of the game, leading, defense, running the bases, putting my plan together at the plate and going up there and executing and just let the results happen. He’s done a great job of that.”
“They all say it’s a different curve — curve, knuckle curve, I feel like they’re all the same,” Judge said. “Those pitches, they’re pretty slow. You’ve just got to try to see it pop above the zone and try to lay off the nasty one that kind of looks like a heater coming in and kind of drops off. So in that situation, seeing Pivetta quite a few times this year, I just saw something pop and tried to take a good swing on it.”
Judge believes he is a “long ways away” from a potential Triple Crown, but added that being a .300 hitter is a significant benchmark for him.
“As a kid, you look up and you see Albert Pujols hitting .330 every year and consistently put up the RBI numbers and stuff like that,” Judge said. “So for me, grading the hitter has always been about average. I might be a little old school … but it’s always been a goal of mine to try and get to that point and do that. I feel like if I’m able to do that, I helped put the team in a good spot and we’re winning games.”
