Aaron Judge hits 40th home run for Yankees

NEW YORK — Aaron Judge joined some select company with his Major League-leading 40th home run in his first at-bat in Friday’s 8-5 loss to the Blue Jays, becoming just the fourth Yankees player to hit 40 or more home runs in at least three separate seasons.

You are probably familiar with the names on the rest of the list: Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Mickey Mantle.

Judge connected in impressive fashion, powering a two-run homer in the first inning off Toronto right-hander Kevin Gausman that landed in the left-field bleachers — a Statcast-projected 477 feet from home plate, the third-longest home run of his career (also 496 feet on Sept. 30, 2017, vs. Toronto, and 495 feet on June 11, 2017, vs. Baltimore).

“If it came with a win tonight, that would be pretty sweet,” Judge said. “We were kind of sitting on 39 [homers] and 99 [RBIs] for a while. Juan [Soto] told me in Philly, ‘Hey, I’m going to keep getting on base because I want to be that 100th RBI. So he was able to do that tonight.”

Judge finished the night 2-for-4 with a walk. Batting .318/.449/.695, he leads the Majors in homers, RBIs (101), on-base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS (1.144), extra-base hits (66), and total bases (271).

“He’s ridiculous,” said Blue Jays manager John Schneider. “His numbers, you look up, it’s a joke.”

The drive, which was the Yankees’ longest homer of the year, came off Judge’s bat at 117.5 mph. It is the second-longest homer hit in the Majors this year, behind Jorge Soler’s 478-foot shot on July 21 at Coors Field.

During his 2022 AL MVP campaign, Judge memorably hit 62 home runs, eclipsing Roger Maris’ single-season American League record. He also hit 52 home runs in 2017, when he was the unanimous AL Rookie of the Year and finished second in MVP voting.

Ruth hit 40 or more homers 11 times, while Gehrig did it five times and Mantle did it four. Judge joined Gehrig as the only players in that group to record three such seasons within their first nine in the Majors.

Friday’s homer was Judge’s sixth career blast off Gausman, his most against any pitcher. It is also the most that Gausman has surrendered to any hitter. Judge entered play on Friday batting .297/.447/.757 (11-for-37) lifetime against Gausman.

“You throw that pitch to Judge, it’s probably going to get hit a long way, and it did,” Gausman said.

Judge’s 37 career home runs against the Blue Jays are also the most by a Yankee off Toronto pitching in franchise history. It’s Judge’s second-most against an opponent, behind the Orioles (42).