Aaron Judge Reaches The 200 Home Run Mark In The Midst Of A Monster Season

Aaron Judge’s 200th career home run adds another credential to what will end up being the greatest season for a New York Yankee in the franchise’s history.

On Saturday afternoon, Judge became the second-fastest player to hit 200 home runs in their career, doing so in 671 career games; only former MLBbro, National League Rookie of the Year, MVP and World Series Champion Ryan Howard of the Philadelphia Phillies got to 200 faster, doing so in only 658 games.

“It’s great, just a lot of hard work with a lot of people over the years to get to this point … but I am glad to get it out of the way,” Judge told reporters after Saturday’s game.

Judge also noted that he was in a race with fellow MLBbro and teammate Aaron Hicks to see if he could reach the 200 mark before Hicks got to 100 (Hicks is currently at 98). That gives Judge a Major League Baseball leading 42 home runs, which is 10 more than the next closest player.

As we close out the month of July, those 42 bombs are the most for a New York Yankee through the month in franchise history and the third most ever in MLB history. The only two players who had more homers by the end of July are home run king Barry Bonds who had 45 in 2001 before finishing with the single season record of 73 and Mark McGwire who had 45 in 1988.

McGwire finished with 70 home runs that season, so we will see if Judge, who is on a current pace for 67, will be able to reach that rare plateau. This is another accolade Judge can add to the case for becoming baseball’s highest paid player this coming offseason, whether that be in the Bronx, Queens or one of the other 29 Major League cities.

During the first half of the season Judge was widely considered the Most Valuable Player in baseball and that has not slowed down post All-Star Break. Since then Judge has hit nine home runs, including two multi-homer games to go along with 21 RBI, seven walks, two steals and 12 runs.

Saturday made for Judge’s 12th home run in the last 14 games, which no player in Yankee history had ever done before. In less than 24 hours since that 42nd home run, Judge has officially become the front runner in Vegas for the American League Most Valuable Player award with those odds at -400. He leads the Majors in runs scored as well as RBI and trails only Yordon Alvarez in slugging percentage and OPS.

Considering that his numbers are only lower than those whose names have been mentioned under the speculation of steroids, Aaron Judge’s 2022 season could end up being the greatest by a single player of all time. However Judge has stayed cool, calm and collected throughout this season when he has been questioned about his future and what seem like daily milestones after each game. The only goal he has is to bring the Yankees their 28th World Series trophy and the franchises first since 2009.

Judge is currently batting .300 with a 1.058 OPS, 91 RBI, 10 steals and those 42 home runs. His Yankees currently have the best record in the American League and are going to be in a Dawg Fight with the Houston Astros for the all important bye in the first round of the playoffs.