Aaron Judge hadn't hit a home run since returning from the injured list. All four of his hits since his return so far had been singles.
That's what YES Network play-by-play announcer was telling viewers when Judge stepped to the plate in the bottom of the first inning on Tuesday night. But then, as soon as Judge made contact, Kay knew: "That's not a single," he exclaimed immediately.
Judge had just provided lift-off to the baseball to send it into the right-center bullpen. And for those who have been following Judge's season, the outcome was no surprise: another first inning home run.
The 6-foot-7 superstar has now hit 14 homers in the first inning this season. That's out of 38 total.
That works out to 36.4% of Judge's homers coming in the first inning, more than a third of the HRs in only one-ninth of a ballgame.
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On the one hand, that's remarkable. Judge finds a way to come to the plate in the first inning ready to rock.
It's not entirely statistically shocking, only because Judge always hits in the first inning as part of the top-three in the batting order. That means he almost never hits in the second inning, for example. Not all innings are created equally in this statistic.
But still: If Judge gets four plate appearances per game, it's still off balance for him to have 36.4% of his home runs in his first time at the dish. It's still incredible.
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That's what Judge does, of course, the incredible, the remarkable, the amazing.
Even with this slump, he should find a way to soar to the AL MVP Award, as long as he gets going a little bit again now, especially if he can lead the Yankees back into the AL East race and out of these doldrums they've been in.
It all starts in the first inning, of course. Win the inning, one at a time, and that can then win a game.
And with Judge, the Yankees always have a fantastic chance of winning the first inning.
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