Sometime in the 19th century, someone threw the first pitch in the history of baseball. This was followed by the second pitch in baseball history, at which point someone said right away that the pitch wasn’t what it used to be.
Baseball is constantly trying to chase after a purer, happier past that never existed, and this strange habit is most evident when discussing the record for one season. Ty Cobb, who rose to stardom in the era of dead balls, used to be wary of the idea that players should even attempt to reach home. Roger Maris’ pursuit of Babe Ruth’s record soon became more of Ruth’s defense than Maris’ celebration; Commissioner Ford Frick said Ruth would be the real record holder as he turned 60 in a 154-game season, while Maris Yankees He played 162, and only 23,154 fans came to watch Maris hit 61st. Then came Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds, and… well, you know that story.
This leads us to Aaron JudgeAnd let’s try to save us from ourselves here. No, he didn’t tie the “real” record to the major league when he set his 61st season record on Wednesday night in Toronto. No, it does not atone for past sports sins. It’s going through one of the most dominant seasons in the game’s history, and if that’s not enough for us, we’ve got problems.
Judge has 61 home runs. Kyle Schwarber has the second most home run in baseball: 42. There’s a bigger gap between Judge and Schwarber than between Schwarber and the players who tied for 42 on their home run list, one of whom is Bo Bichette, a star who is having a great year for himself but He still only has one hit for every 2.5 judges.
Judge would have a legendary season even if he came straight out of the Dave Kingman/Adam Dunn/Chris Davis mold and the vast majority of his value came from home strikes. But of course, this is not the judge at all. If you look up the word “completed” in the dictionary, you should really expand your vocabulary, because most people know what that word means. But anyway, Judge witnesses one of the most complete chapters in baseball history.
He leads the league in base percentage. He can win the Triple Crown. He even stole 16 bases in 19 attempts.
There is a difference between comparing with past eras and competing with them. The comparison is fun. The competition is annoying. We can compare Judge’s dominance to Ruth or Barry Bonds, but we don’t need Judge to undo the exploits (or misdeeds) of 1998 and 2001. This is a beautiful, messy sport with a long, beautiful, and chaotic history. Sometimes a great player has a special season. This is Aaron Judge in 2022. It doesn’t have to be more or less than that. – Michael Rosenberg
Wendell Cruz / USA Today Sports
What Aaron Judge is doing this year is amazing, but not because he tied Roger Maris’ MLS record at home. Barry Bonds blew up the major league tag in 2001, before MLB began testing performance-enhancing drugs, but Judge knows the number that counts. He said a lot to SI’s Tom Verducci: “Seventy-three is the record.”
Do you know who holds the record in the National League in a streak of strokes? Probably not, because the important number is 56, set by Joe Dimaggio in 1941. (Wee Willie Keeler, plays for NL Baltimore Orioles, hit at 45 straight from 1896 to ’97.) League records were weighted in an ancient era, when the two sides had different rules and never met in the regular season; Now, with two 15-team leagues, there’s at least one game a day. In fact, Judge has hit nine of his 61 grenades against NL teams, including #58 and #59.
The number 61 has become an arbitrary sign. The best statistic by which a judge’s greatness can be measured is 19: the number of home runs he has made ahead of second place, PhyllisKyle Schwarber, who has 42. No player has made such a huge lead over the rest of the league since Babe Ruth had 23 more than anyone else in 1928. That’s historic. – Stephanie Epstein
Vincent Carchetta/USA Today Sports
Over the past few months, when Aaron Judge launched his home run at an astonishing rate, many of us who cover baseball have been asked what we consider truly He scored for one season to run at home. Quoting MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred, “I reject the premise of the question.”
In fact, until someone hits more than 73 zingers in a year, the answer will always be Barry Bonds. There are no things like clean records or dirty records (unless you’re talking about the rotting old boxes of Mills Brothers albums in my parents’ garage).
Homer the 61st judge believes in a different kind of honor, though, one we can bestow on him whether he holds the record or not: the greatest home hitting season ever. greatest Accounts for context and encourage discussion.
Unlike Bonds, Mark McGwire, and Sammy Sosa, Judge reached Homer’s standard of 60 without the aid of performance-enhancing drugs. Unlike Roger Maris, the Judge 60 came in his team’s first 154 games, which was the length of the big league season when Babe Ruth hit 60 in 1927. Perhaps most striking is that Judge is doing his best while he is most Much more difficult to do, at least to the extent that the judge has. When Maris turned 61, he raced with teammate Mickey Mantle for most of the season, until Mantell injured his hip in September and finished with a score of 54. In the other three seasons the player turned 60, someone else did too. This year, the player next in the rankings, Kyle Schwarber, is 19th behind Judge.
Incredibly, the Yankees still have seven games left in the season. Judge hasn’t finished going into the yard, unless opposing teams keep rallying around him, as they did in the week between teammates 60 and 61. He won’t hit 12 again this year, equaling Bonds’ number, but he could still add more teammates to what It is the greatest achievement in MLB history. – Matt Martell
Associated Press/Noah K. Murray
People were waiting. It was the implicit text of each panel appearance, all spit, which the Yankees have seen since the judge hit No. 60. Everyone on the field waited for a home run from Aaron Judge, and then everyone did at Rogers Center in Toronto as well. It was impossible to ignore the energy. Or, at least, it had to be. But while everyone else was waiting for him to leave the yard – again – the judge was doing something else: he was showing off every other part of his vast skill set. This was perhaps the most impressive part of his brilliant season. It is not just limited to the house. it’s a everything. It’s a chase for the Triple Crown – it currently tops all three categories. It’s his understanding of the area, his skills for getting to base when his team needs it most, and his ability to fire a missile from a distance into the field.
In one of the greatest individual offensive performances in recent memory, Judge was much more than a simple one-dimensional player. It was the complete package. He showed this in the space between his prominent home runs. However, in all of this waiting — lying underneath every other talent show — he still feels he might do it at any time. There was no context in which I felt a home run was unbearable for Judge. In any situation, in any situation, and any opposing shooter, he made it seem possible. Which was probably the most amazing piece of all. Even if he made you wait, he made it worth your while. – Emma Batcheleri
More MLB coverage:
• Everything about Aaron Judge’s career has led him to this historic season
• The undeniable thrill of waiting for Judge Harun to reach 62
• Albert Pujols’ 700th home race is the culmination of his final challenging season
• Julio Rodriguez is here to save the seafarers
• Inside the Drive: The Junior Leagues That Raised a League on MLB
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