New York Yankees superstar Aaron Judge is back in pinstripes, and he made it clear he wanted more than a half-night’s work.
The Yankees beat the Colorado Rockies 5-3 on Tuesday at Yankee Stadium in the first game of a homestand that finally included their captain. Judge, returning after a stress fracture in his right first rib, started in right field and hit third. He went 0-for-3 with two strikeouts and was replaced to start the seventh inning by Heliot Ramos.
Manager Aaron Boone had said before first pitch that Judge would not play the whole game, even though he wanted to. Boone also said Judge would likely sit one night in the series. That plan did not sit well with the three-time MVP.
“I feel great… played half a game so I don’t know what to say about that,” Judge said. “I respect Booney. So whatever he says I’m gonna do, but not happy about it. But that’s where my guy Ramos picked me up and hit a nice little three-run homer there to kind of put the game out… but yeah not too happy about it.”
Ramos did pick him up. He launched a three-run homer to center in the eighth, a 402-foot drive off Brennan Bernardino that made it 5-1. Hunter Goodman later hit a two-run shot in the ninth, but David Bednar closed it out.
Cam Schlittler set the tone on the mound. The right-hander worked seven innings, allowed one run and three hits, walked nobody and struck out 10. He improved to 13-6. Ryan McMahon’s double in the fifth scored George Lombard Jr. and gave New York a 2-1 lead.
A sellout crowd of 46,211 greeted Judge with a standing ovation when he took the field. He smiled and tapped the interlocking NY on his jersey. The results at the plate were quiet. He struck out swinging against Gabriel Hughes in the first, flied out in the fourth and took a called third strike from Mark Manfredi in the sixth.
Judge had not played since May 31. The injury, first thought to be a bone bruise, turned out to be a stress fracture. He missed 84 games and about 99 days, a stretch that matched his uniform number. He skipped a minor league rehab assignment and took live batting practice on Monday’s off day instead.
“I wanted to come back a couple months ago, but I’m not a trainer. So I gotta check whatever boxes they got,” Judge said. “A box they wanted me to check was live hitting, so I said, ‘Perfect, we’ll do that on the off day so I can play.’”
He framed the night in simple terms.
“I get paid to do this, so I gotta go do it,” he said. “That’s the end of it. I get paid to go out there and give my best to the New York Yankees and these fans.”
Before the injury, Judge hit .248 with 17 home runs and 38 RBIs in 59 games. The Yankees were 36-23 at that point. They went 45-39 without him and now sit at 82-62 after Tuesday’s win. They remain four games behind the Tampa Bay Rays in the AL East and moved three games ahead of the Boston Red Sox for the top wild-card spot.
The offense sagged while he was out. New York hit .243 with an average of 5.17 runs per game through May 31, then .227 and 4.06 runs a night in his absence. Boone said the club “hung in there” through those stretches.
The win also locked up the Yankees’ 34th straight winning season, the second-longest such streak in the four major sports.
Boone said the staff will stay careful this week. Judge is expected to get a full day off during the Rockies series before the Mets arrive for a Subway Series. The manager sounded glad just to have him back in the building.
“Off we go,” Boone said. “Obviously, excited to have our captain back.”
Judge sounded ready for more innings than he got. The New York Yankees sound ready to ease him in anyway. With 18 games left after Tuesday, both sides will have to meet in the middle.
