HOUSTON — Aaron Judge and the Yankees both cautioned that he was not 100 percent — and likely would not be for the rest of the season — when he returned from a torn ligament on his big right toe in late July.
A little over a month later, that has become less and less obvious.
While Judge’s two-month injury absence helped derail the Yankees’ season — though their issues stemmed beyond just not having him — they can take some comfort heading into the offseason in how he has looked since coming back.
The reigning AL MVP’s improvements were on full display in Saturday’s win over the Astros as he crushed a 428-foot blast to right-center field for his ninth home run in his last 15 games.
But just as encouraging as Judge’s power, if not more, was how he looked running the bases — which was noticeably not great when he first came back.
On Saturday, though, he was able to bust it going from first to third on Jasson Dominguez’s hard ground ball to right field and then later scored on a sacrifice fly to shallow center field.
“Seems like pretty significant improvement,” manager Aaron Boone said Sunday before Judge went 0-for-4 with two strikeouts during the Yankees’ 6-1 victory over the Astros.
While it may seem counterintuitive, the Yankees were hopeful that Judge’s toe would continue to improve the more he played on it over the final two months of the season.
That has seemingly come to fruition.
“I would say it’s gone as well as we could’ve hoped,” Boone said. “I’ve been really pleased with how much he’s been able to play, how well he’s been able to play and what I feel like is continued improvement just in his movement qualities.”
Judge started Sunday for the 32nd time in the Yankees’ 35th game since he was activated off the IL. In his first 31 games, he was hitting .223 with a .928 OPS and 12 home runs.
The power has been on full display, especially of late.
Entering Sunday, he had recorded 31 home runs, which was the fourth-most in the American League.
He had hit that mark in 82 games while the top three home run hitters in the AL had all played 128 games or more.
“The best player in the world,” Anthony Volpe said.
Judge, never one to talk much about his own numbers, was asked how he would evaluate another player’s season if they had 31 home runs in 82 games.
“I’d be hoping that the [82] games would be somewhere in the middle of the year and not near the end of the year,” he said with a grin. “It is what it is.”
It is impossible to know where the Yankees would stand if Judge had been available to them all season.
Their 14-21 record since he came back offered a reminder that their problems run deeper than just having missed him for two months.
But it’s at least possible that if Judge had not run into the right-field wall at Dodger Stadium to make a highlight-reel catch June 3, the final month of this season might still be about a playoff race — or even a home run chase — instead of a youth movement.
“I mean, he’s just a great, great player,” Boone said. “He’s just so consistent in his approach and who he is and how he plays the game. Obviously when you can miss-hit balls at times and still hit it out to all fields, that’s kind of a nice luxury to have. [Friday and Saturday], the balls he’s hit, those are the fun ones to watch.
“It’s remarkable what he’s able to do. It’s good to see him playing that way. It’s good to see him moving around. That first-to-third on the base hit, scoring on the sac fly, he looks really good moving around and running, too, which is great to continue to see him looking like that on the bases.”
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