Aaron Judge’s homerless streak reached a career-high 16 games on Thursday night, as the Red Sox kept the slugger in the yard during the Yankees’ 2-1, 10-inning, walk-off win.
Judge, baseball’s home run leader, has been stuck on 51 longballs since mashing two bombs against the Rockies on Aug. 25. The Dodgers’ Shohei Ohtani is now just a few homers behind him. He woke up with 47 on Friday.
Judge came a few feet short of ending his streak in the first inning on Thursday, as he drove a ball to the right field warning track for a flyout. He ultimately went 1-for-4 with a single and a few outs that had high expected batting averages.
“He’s got 51 homers on the year,” Aaron Boone said when asked about Judge’s power outage. “Tonight, he just missed one.
“Homers, even for guys like him, they still come in bunches, and you’re going to have those stretches. I guess it’s amazing that he has avoided those, but that’s just a testament to how good of a hitter he is and how much power he has.”
In addition to a dinger drought, Judge has been in a slump since Aug. 25, hitting .207/.352/.259 with four RBI over those 16 games. His groundball and hard-hit rates have moved in the wrong direction over that span.
Fans have jokingly dubbed this slump the “Paw Patrol Curse,” as Judge made an appearance on “Rubble & Crew, a spin-off of the popular animated children’s cartoon at the start of this stretch. However, his skid began with the Yankees’ series against the Nationals on Aug. 26. That day, Judge could be seen grimacing while rounding first base after a ninth-inning single. Asked if he was OK after the game, the center fielder turned to a Yankees spokesperson to ask how many games the team had played. He then said he was OK.
Judge also found himself in a funk at the beginning of the season, as he hit .197 over his first 33 games. Since then, he’s put up historic numbers while establishing himself as the MVP frontrunner, even with his recent slide.
“You guys saw what happened in April. He took a little bit and then he went on a tear. He probably needs to get thrown out again [by] an umpire,” Nestor Cortes said, a joking reference to Judge’s first-career ejection on May 4. “On a serious note, Judge is gonna come out again, and he’s gonna be the guy for us, no doubt.
“He’s getting base hits. He’s getting on base. He’s creating traffic. The homers haven’t been there, but I know they’ll come around. He’s a big boy.”
