David Lennon: Yankees' Aaron Judge shouldn't overlook the guy in the mirror
Angels centerfielder Mike Trout and Yankees rightfielder Aaron Judge each homered twice on Monday night at Yankee Stadium Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
Aaron Judge called Mike Trout “the greatest of all time” late Monday night after the two staged what amounted to a longest-drive contest at Yankee Stadium.
Our response? Not so fast, Aaron.
Think it over. Then grab a mirror.
So I asked Judge before Tuesday’s game what it felt like when people referred to him as the GOAT, as plenty already do, and that probably being the consensus when his No. 99 ultimately winds up in Monument Park. He paused a bit before answering.
“I don’t know if I have a good answer for you on that one,” a smiling Judge told Newsday. “It’s tough, because I play this game for many reasons. But a lot of it, I play for my teammates, my family and the fans here in New York.
“So I never try to really focus on where I rank in any individual category, because that’s not what this game is about. It’s a team game, it’s about winning baseball games, and hopefully, when my career is over, they can talk about me being a winner and being a great leader here in New York.”
Yes, Trout put on quite a show during Monday’s nearly four-hour slugfest, smashing a pair of home runs, just missing a third and also making a leaping catch at the centerfield wall to rob Randal Grichuk of his first hit in pinstripes.
But Judge matched him swing for swing in the Yankees’ 11-10 victory, hammering two majestic homers himself -- one traveled 456 feet, the other 398 -- and both put his team ahead.
If not for Angels closer Jordan Romano’s game-deciding wild pitch in the ninth, Judge was up next with the bases loaded, and we’re pretty confident the Yankees captain would’ve finished the job anyway.
“That’s baseball for you,” Trout said afterward. “It’s what fans want, and to be able to see something like that, pretty cool.”
Judge was being a gracious winner in dropping the GOAT label on Trout when he faced the media afterward. In our view, the crown already has been passed, and it’s the guy in the Bronx who deserves the title now (for the sake of this debate, Shohei Ohtani gets his own category as a two-way unicorn).
Both Judge and Trout have three MVPs, but the Angels’ franchise player last won the trophy in 2019, and never back-to-back, as the captain has over the past two seasons. Judge, who turns 35 later this month, is actually 103 days older than Trout, who’s played five more years -- but just 503 more games.
At Trout’s peak, he never had an OPS-plus above 198, which gauges the stat in relation to his peers (100 being average). Over three of the past four seasons, Judge went 210, 225 and 214. In total WAR, Trout has a considerable edge, based both on his longevity, base-stealing (in his prime) and defensive prowess in centerfield, outpacing Judge, 88.5 to 63.2. Going by a 162-game average, however, Judge has a slim 8.8 to 8.6 advantage.
Oddly enough, Judge and Trout have identical batting averages (.293). Trout has more homers (408-374) and RBIs (1030-842) -- again, the longevity thing -- but Judge’s career 1.026 OPS is well ahead of Trout’s .976.
Beyond the numbers, Judge has consistently performed under baseball’s brightest spotlight, as the highest-profile player for what is generally regarded as the most famous franchise in professional sports. It’s all Judge has known, and he’s been the driving force behind the Yankees making the playoffs in eight of his 10 full seasons.
That’s a much different experience than Trout’s in SoCal, where he’s made the playoffs once, a three-game sweep by the Royals in the 2014 Division Series. Five years later, Trout re-upped with the Angels on a 12-year, $426.5 million extension, and they’ve never won more than 77 games since.
If that’s not MLB purgatory, it’s in the same zip code, and Trout has labored through numerous injuries in relative obscurity, a strange existence for a star of his stature. For Judge, not a day of his life goes by without him being the center of attention, and by night, in the Bronx, he takes on Ruthian stature.
“I put a lot of pressure on myself,” Judge said. “And I think also the expectations of playing here in New York, wearing the pinstripes, you got to deliver. These fans are paying good money to come out here and watch me go four-for-four with four homers ... (laughs) ... so that’s always my expectation.”
When I circle back to the GOAT moniker again, and the weight that comes with living up to that title, Judge again finds it difficult to describe what it’s like being in those spikes.
“You caught me off guard with this one a little bit,” Judge says. “It’s just that I got a responsibility to these fans when I go out there. Over the course of my career, if you can look back and rank with some of the all-time greats, that’d be incredible. But I just want to bring a championship back to New York any way that I can.”
That’s the only trophy still eluding Judge to this point. In the meantime, he’ll continue putting on fireworks shows like Monday night, and going head-to-head with the game’s other titans. When talking about GOATs, however, Judge shouldn’t overlook the guy in the mirror. It’s the same one the rest of us are marveling at too.
David Lennon is an award-winning columnist, a voter for baseball's Hall of Fame and has covered six no-hitters, including two perfect games.