Watch: Yankees outfielder Aaron Judge crushes a ball to deep, deep center
It's only the first day of spring training, but we've already got a highlight worth sharing from Friday's Yankees-Phillies game in Tampa. With one out, nobody on and New York up 1–0 on Philadelphia in the bottom of the fifth, young rightfielder Aaron Judge stepped to the plate against lefthander Elneiry Garcia and absolutely unloaded on a ball, crushing a solo home run nearly all the way out of Tampa's George M. Steinbrenner Field. Don't believe me? Take a gander at the video, and weep for that baseball, because it had a family.
(Note: It is very fun to imagine that, right after Judge sentenced that ball to death, he smiled and muttered to himself, "Court's adjourned," or some other law pun.)
Judge is no stranger to moonshots—the giant 24-year-old has made a habit of destroying balls throughout the minors, in batting practice and a couple of times with the Yankees last season—but Friday's blast was something else. There's no Statcast data available for the homer, but Judge's shot landed in the deepest part of the park, and if it weren't for the scoreboard it slammed into, it might've gone out of the stadium entirely.
The former first-round pick and top prospect is penciled as New York's starting rightfielder to begin the season, so don't be surprised if you see a few more home runs like this throughout 2017.
