Aaron Judge is off to the hot start everybody wanted
In
the bottom of the seventh inning of Wednesday’s matinee against the Tampa Bay
Rays, Aaron Judge hit his third home run in as many games. Through eight games,
Judge is batting .308 with three home runs and seven RBIs. Early on in the
campaign, the 6'7" right fielder has shown a propensity for producing clutch hits with exit
velocities nearing 120 mph.
Photo Credit: Charles Wenzelberg/New York Post
Judge
is visibly more patient and confident at the plate than he was last year.
Instead of swinging and missing, Judge is capitalizing on mistakes and laying
off pitches out of the zone. In 2016, in just 84 at-bats, Judge had 42
strikeouts compared to only nine walks. That’s roughly four strikeouts for
every walk, and one strikeout every two at-bats. At times Judge would go several
games without walking, and struck out in 21 of his first 22 games. So far this
year, albeit a much smaller sample size, Judge has six strikeouts to only three
walks. If Judge can keep the strikeouts down and walk more often, his OBP will
skyrocket and Joe Girardi will have no choice but to move him up in the lineup.
Although
some fans will already be tempted to move Judge into the middle of the lineup
because he is hitting over .300, Judge should probably remain in the bottom
third for the time being. I would like to see at least two more weeks of
consistent production before he moves up a couple of spots. He has to show he
isn’t worth the risk of pitching around Matt Holliday before making him
Holliday’s protection.
Situational
hitting is very important at the MLB level, and Judge has performed well in the
clutch so far this year. Judge hit a game-tying moonshot in Baltimore on
Sunday, which gave the Yankees the momentum they needed for a comeback victory.
He did it again Wednesday when he almost
took Jumbo Diaz’s head off with a game-tying line drive in the sixth inning.
When Judge barrels the ball vicious contact is made. The aforementioned
game-tying line drive came off his bat at 116 MPH! By cutting down on swings
and misses, his rate of contact will go up. And if his rate of contact goes up,
pitchers will need to keep their heads on a swivel if they want to keep their
heads at all.
It
will be very interesting to see how Judge fairs in the upcoming series against
the St. Louis Cardinals. He will face two right-handed aces in Carlos Martinez
and Adam Wainwright on Saturday and Sunday. Recently Judge has done most of his
damage off of the other team’s bullpen. However, if Judge can make an impact in
his first or second at-bat against the opposing team’s starting pitcher, that
will set up the Yankees for success. Getting early leads is crucial for the
Yankees to unleash their back end of the bullpen, while simultaneously getting
to the weaker parts of opponents’ bullpens.
With
Gary Sanchez out for the first month and Greg Bird off to a slow start, it is
Aaron Judge’s time to shine. Right now the star is shining bright and it
doesn’t seem like that will stop any time soon.
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