Yankees’ Aaron Judge enters 2024 MLB playoffs off a regular season that was even better than it appeared

At 94-68, the New York Yankees finished with the best record in the American League this season, and they will face the Kansas City Royals in the ALDS beginning Saturday. The Yankees had a bye and spent this past week sleeping in their own beds, playing simulated games to stay sharp, and hoping the Orioles vs. Royals Wild Card Series was as long and grueling as possible.

New York was of course led by Aaron Judge, the AL MVP favorite, and the game’s best hitter and player in 2024 in the regular season. He led the sport in home runs (58), RBI (144), OPS (1.159), WAR (10.8), on and on we could go. Juan Soto had a terrific season — .288/.419/.569 with 41 home runs and 7.9 WAR — and is more like a second Batman than Judge’s Robin, but clearly, Judge is the centerpiece.

“He’s still playing video games and we’re out there working,” Giancarlo Stanton said about Judge’s season last week (via the New York Post). “Incredible to watch.”

When their postseason begins Saturday, Judge and the Yankees will look to win the franchise’s first championship since 2009, which is really the only thing missing from Judge’s resume at this point. He doesn’t have a World Series ring yet. In Yankees lore, he’s more Don Mattingly than Derek Jeter, not that that’s a bad thing, of course.

Here are four ways Judge’s monster 2024 season was even more impressive than it appears on the surface.

He was better than 2022

Two years ago Judge hit 62 home runs, setting a new American League single-season record, and it earned him AL MVP honors. He did not break his own single-season home run record this year, he only — “only” — hit 58 home runs, but Judge’s 2024 was indeed better than his 2022. Here is the comparison:

Across the board, Judge was better in 2024 than 2022. Higher average, more on-base, more slug, fewer strikeouts, more walks, the works. If there was one negative in Judge’s offensive game this year, it was his league-leading 22 double plays. Having Soto on base so much ahead of him contributed to that, though Judge’s 11.0% double play rate was his highest in four years.

Even with the double plays, Judge was the best hitter in baseball this year — there’s a 123-point gap in OPS between Judge and the runner-up (Shohei Ohtani) — and he was even better this season than he was during his record-setting MVP season two years ago.

Judge saw more non-fastballs than almost anyone

Judge is a large man (listed at 6-foot-7 and 282 lbs.) with a lot of strike zone to cover, and pitchers attack him with breaking balls and offspeed pitches down and away constantly. If you make a mistake, Judge will hit it off the scoreboard. Execute that pitch though, and you’ll get him out, as you will most hitters with a well-executed breaking ball or changeup.

Only two hitters in baseball saw more breaking balls and offspeed pitches than Judge: Soto and José Ramírez. And that makes sense, right? The best hitters see the fewest fastballs because fastballs are generally easier to hit than pitches than bend. With Judge though, all the non-fastballs didn’t help much. He was a monster against all pitch types:

Judge was better against non-fastballs (curveballs, sliders, changeups, etc.) than the average hitter was against non-fastballs. Per Statcast, Judge had a positive run value against all pitch types and was the best hitter in baseball against four-seam fastballs, sinkers, and sweepers. Three heavily used pitch types and he was the best hitter in the league against all of them.

Your best bet against Judge is a breaking ball down and away, forcing him to reach and limiting his hard-hit ability (in theory) if you don’t get a swing and miss. It’s easier said than done though, because Judge is still excellent against breaking balls. He’s excellent against all pitch types. There is no obvious, exploitable hole in his swing despite his size.

He joined the 700-700 club

Ohtani was the charter member of the 50-50 club this season (he finished at 54-59). Judge also joined an exclusive club. The 700-700 club. That is 700 plate appearances with a .700 slugging percentage. Judge is the sixth player to do it (seven instances). Here is the 700/700 club:

Only a handful of players each year get 700 plate appearances (seven did in 2024) and they’re usually leadoff hitters, or guys who hit near the top of the lineup. Think Jarren Duran, Bobby Witt Jr., etc. You have to stay healthy and also perform well to get that many plate appearances, because if you don’t perform, you lose playing time and get dropping in the lineup.

The 700-700 club represents both quantity and quality. Judge this season is the first qualified hitter to slug .700 since Barry Bonds in 2004, and there have been only 13 qualified hitters with a .700 slugging percentage in the Expansion Era (since 1961). Combine that with a near league-leading plate appearance total, and that is a whole lot of historically great production.

Was it the best season by a right-handed hitter ever?

The case can be made that yes, Judge just put together the best season by the right-handed hitter in AL/NL history. OPS+ adjusts for ballpark, the league’s offensive environment, and a host of other things, and boils offensive performance down to one single number. A 100 OPS+ is league average and the higher, the better. The lower, the worse.

Judge had a 223 OPS+ this season, which essentially means he was 113% better than the league average hitter. That’s the best mark by a qualified hitter since Bonds had a 263 OPS+ in 2004. Here are the best offensive seasons by a right-handed hitter in the Modern Era (since 1900):

By at least one measure, Judge just put together the best season by a right-handed hitter in AL/NL history. OPS+ allows us to compare players across eras because he it does adjust for the league environment, and Judge narrowly outdid Hornsby. Is one point of OPS+ enough to definitely say Judge had a better season? Eh, maybe it’s not that precise, but Judge is in the conversation.

Over the last three years Judge has authored .304/.433/.674 line with 157 homers in 421 games. That’s a 204 OPS+ in 1,858 plate appearances. It’s one of the most dominant three-year stretches in history. Judge’s “down” year in that time was a .267/.406/.613 line with 37 homers in 2023, when he missed two months with a toe injury after running into the Dodger Stadium wall.

No matter how you slice — and there are a great many ways to slice it — Judge is cementing himself as one of the greatest offensive forces the game has ever seen. His hard-hit ability is unmatched, he’s a .300 hitter, and he gets on base like no one else in the sport. Even after winning MVP and hitting 62 homers a year ago, Judge just concluded the finest season of his career.