Aaron Judge had a relatively uneventful game as the New York Yankees rallied to defeat the Philadelphia Phillies 7-6 in 12 innings on Tuesday night. The Yankees’ exciting new addition, Jazz Chisholm Jr., stole the spotlight with two home runs, while Judge was kept without a home run for the second time in his last three games.
Judge finished 3-for-4 with two walks, bringing his batting average to .319 for the season. Despite this, his average is only the third-highest in baseball this year, which is why YES omitted his batting average from a graphic that highlighted his MLB rankings in eight other statistical categories.
Leading the league in home runs, RBI, WAR, OBP, SLG, OPS, extra-base hits, and total bases makes it somewhat surprising to be only third in batting average. Unless Bobby Witt Jr. and Steven Kwan face significant slumps in August, Judge may not contend seriously for the Triple Crown, a rare achievement accomplished only once since the 1960s by Miguel Cabrera in 2012.
It’s also noteworthy that Judge doesn’t even lead his own team in walks; Juan Soto has 88 compared to Judge’s 86. Additionally, six players have more intentional walks than Judge this season, raising questions about whether pitchers are truly afraid of him.
Despite his dominance, Judge isn’t on track to surpass his personal record of 62 home runs in a season. As of Tuesday, he has hit 39 home runs, projecting to finish with 58 this year, which barely ranks among the top 20 home run totals of all time.
Perhaps next year, Judge will manage to combine all his achievements into a comprehensive list of ten categories and finally secure that elusive dectuple crown.
