Aaron Judge Batting Fourth Makes Yankees a Most Intimidating Team
Joe Girardi likes to manage by the book. But he and the Yankees will need to use some unconventional thinking if they want Judge to be successful.
While the Yankees farm system is loaded, there is no guarantee which, if any, prospects will work out. Many of them, like Jorge Mateo and Clint Frazier, have plenty of potential. That plus five dollars will get you a grande mocha latte at Starbucks. But it will not get you even one hit in the MLB.
Aaron Judge, however, is what is called a Prospect Plus: a player with one overwhelming aspect to his talent. For Judge, it is his power potential. He can guess wrong on a pitch and still swat it 400 feet. Even for power hitters, Judge is a unicorn.
And this is the moment both he and the Yankees have been waiting for. Aaron will come into Spring Training as the starting right fielder. If you don’t believe me, just ask Hal Steinbrenner.
Judge also comes into the season with some big league experience, albeit without the results he would like. The point is that the initial butterflies should be gone and he should be ready to focus on success instead of being overwhelmed by the opportunity.
I Love the Word ‘Plop’
As we all saw last year, the dew is off the lily. Judge struggled mightily, hitting just .179/.263/.345 in his 27 games for the Yanks. Right field might be his to lose but his performance last year has him halfway to losing it already. For Judge’s sake, he must perform in his first 200 at-bats or his career is probably over.
That is no good for Judge, the Yankees, or the fans.
The Yankees and Joe Girardi can change all of that with one simple decision: bat Judge fourth. And not just for a few AB’s. He needs to be plopped down in the middle of the line-up and left there for all 200 at-bats.
This would be unusual for Joe. The book says you start young hitters off lower in the order. One, it takes the pressure off of the player. Over 150 years of tradition tells us that the best hitters are at the top of the line-up and the rest bat at the bottom. Players know this and understand the expectations of each spot.
This gives a young player time to develop without pressure. And if you can produce out of the No. 7 or No. 8 hole, you get moved up. We all hope that happens for Didi Gregorius this year.
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Two, it protects the club. Nothing kills a team more than a slumping hitter coming to bat in the middle of a rally (see Aaron Hicks). It is why so many of us want to see the National League move to the DH. I have seen countless games during which the Mets or Giants have two on and one out in a tie game and the pitcher comes up, with his sub-.100 batting average. Rally and inning now over.
The Fear Factor
But Judge can be special in a way few can. So the Yankees need to take special care of him. They need to surround him with their other great hitters to force pitchers to throw him meatier pitches. Imagine the line-up: Gardner at the top followed by Didi. Then comes Matt Holliday, Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez, Greg Bird and Starlin Castro; Headley and Jake complete the list.
The danger here is obvious. Judge batting fourth could ruin more scoring opportunities than arriving too late for an orgy. Even writing this now I cringe to think of him striking out with men on while Sanchez gets stranded in the batter’s box.
The upside is also obvious. If batting Judge fourth forces pitchers to throw him a better selection than they want, knowing Sanchez and Bird are waiting with their own prodigious power, and Judge mistakes a few balls 400 feet or more, the Yankees will create the most powerful line-up in baseball (“mistakes”; I love creating verbs).
And the effect will be even greater than that. If Judge can do in the Bronx what he did last year in Scranton, he will become a feared man. That in turn, changes how every pitcher approaches him and we could arrive at one of two scenarios each night.
One is that Judge will be intentionally walked regularly, meaning they now have to throw to Sanchez. That can only make Gary and the rest of the line-up much more dangerous. Or pitchers in a tight spot have to pitch to Judge, meaning he will get a lot more pitches in the zone. And when the pitcher knows that any pitch in the zone can turn into a highlight, he gets nervous. Nervous people make mistakes and mistakes become home runs.
Where Can I Find the Schedule?
That could be the situation the Yankees put the rest of the league in. I hope Brian Cashman and Joe Girardi are somewhere doing a cost-benefit analysis right now.
This plan has little chance of being implemented. Girardi and the Yanks will wait to see if Judge can produce without help. That’s the way it has always been done. But without any help, Judge might put up the same numbers he did last year. If he does, well, I guess I need to find out what he got his degree in to predict what he might do after the 2017 season.
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With help, though, he could become the most feared hitter in the league and the Yankees the most intimidating team. For that to happen, the Yankees will have to throw away the book. And that has as much chance of happening as my wife allowing me to go to the next scheduled orgy.
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