aaron judge yankees
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In the Yankees’ series opener against the Los Angeles Angels on Tuesday night, a first-inning home run from Shohei Ohtani set the tone for an L.A. victory. He tried doing the same thing on Wednesday, but Aaron Judge wasn’t having any of it. And then, he did Ohtani one better during the bottom of the first.

Judge brought an Ohtani big fly back with a juggling catch to keep the game scoreless at Yankee Stadium. When he stepped into the batter’s box for his first plate appearance of the evening, he showed everyone how it’s done with a homer of his own.

According to Sports Info Solutions, Judge is the third player to join the “Hit a Home Run/Rob a Home Run” club by doing both in the same game. He’s also proven to be a master at robbing home runs in general:

So, you’re telling me this guy is one of the game’s premier home run hitters and is also skilled enough in the outfield to take them away on a consistent basis? That’s pretty cool. It’s almost like he should be MVP or something.

That first-inning homer from Judge was all the runs New York would get, until the 10th inning. That’s when Gleyber Torres’ sac fly led to a walk-off win in the Bronx. That homer from the Captain is his sixth of the season. It’s accompanied by 11 RBI, a 167 wRC+, and 1.0 fWAR through his first 76 plate appearances (18 games) of 2023.

In case you’re curious as to how that pace looks compared to last April, it’s quite comparable. Through his first 84 plate appearances (20 games played), Judge had six homers, 13 RBI, and a 173 wRC+.

Could it be Deja vu all over again for the slugging outfielder? He’ll have to get insanely hot again for the next few months, but you never know. At least the Yankees won’t have to pay him again if he does.

You can reach Matt Musico at [email protected]. You can follow him on Twitter: @mmusico8.

Matt Musico is an editor for ESNY. He’s been writing about baseball and the Mets for the past decade. His work has been featured on numberFire, MetsMerized Online, Bleacher Report, and Yahoo! Sports.