Aaron Judge desperately tried to return for the postseason after straining his calf, but the New York Yankees captain was wisely left off the Wild Card series roster.
Judge sustained a moderate soleus muscle strain in his calf and received a platelet-poor plasma (PPP) injection to try to speed up his rehab, but it wasn’t enough for him to make the roster for the team’s best-of-three series against the Boston Red Sox. Former college football quarterback-turned-foot-and-ankle surgeon Dr. Drew Burdi said if Judge came back too soon, he could leave himself exposed to further injury.
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“If you do go too fast, too soon, you could just make it a more severe injury. It’s a soleus, so that could lead to overstraining (the) hamstring, up and down. So that’s your calf muscle, or part of the calf muscle. You could put more strain on your Achilles, you could put more strain on your hamstrings, and that could lead to other injuries,” Burdi told OutKick in a recent interview.
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Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees looks on during a game against the Minnesota Twins on Sept. 16, 2026, at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minn. (Brace Hemmelgarn/Minnesota Twins/Getty Images)
Burdi explained that strains involve varying degrees of muscle tearing and that a premature return to play could cause Judge’s strain to go from moderate to severe. A more severe tear could lead to a much longer recovery time, regardless of the treatment used.
“If you’re not ready to go back in yet, you tear it more, you can get to a point where the advanced conservative therapies like PRP injections, shock wave therapy, these guys are getting oxygen chamber therapy. This stuff can only go so far. The body can only adapt so much, can only heal so quickly,” Burdi said.
The worst potential outcome of Judge returning too soon could be an Achilles rupture. Burdi said such an injury is a possibility.
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Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees looks on during a game against the Minnesota Twins on Sept. 16, 2026, at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minn. (Brace Hemmelgarn/Minnesota Twins/Getty Images)
“Possibly, yeah, I mean, that’s always a risk. Again, it, it kind of depends how he feels, but it’s always a risk, and Achilles is always so scary because a lot of people, you see it in football, guys are jumping up on the sidelines and they come down weird and they rupture their Achilles. You’re just like, wow, they don’t even feel it before it happens,” Burdi said.
“That’s tough because those are tough injuries to come back from. Guys do do it, but they’re never quite the same.”
Burdi said that while Achilles injuries aren’t necessarily career killers, they are career changers.
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Aaron Judge #99 of the New York Yankees looks on during a workout ahead of the American League Wild Card Series against the Boston Red Sox on Sept. 28, 2026, at Yankee Stadium in New York, N.Y. (New York Yankees/Getty Images)
So while the Yankees may have a Judgian-sized hole in their Wild Card Series lineup, leaving Judge off the roster could be the safer long-term approach. Judge said he intended to try to play in Game 1, but the three-time American League MVP didn’t recover in time.
While Judge might not have been hitting like himself in his seven games back from the rib injury that kept him out since June, going 4 for 23 with one home run and 13 strikeouts, his presence in the lineup was a boost. Even when the Yankees’ captain isn’t hitting, Judge’s presence in the lineup takes pressure off other hitters.
In 66 games this season, Judge is hitting .241 with 18 home runs and 41 RBI. He hopes the Yankees can eliminate the rival Boston Red Sox in the Wild Card Series so he can rejoin the team in the ALDS.