The Yankees will hit again when Aaron Judge does

If you want to blame someone for the Yankees’ recent offensive slump, look no farther than team captain and reigning MVP Aaron Judge.

The big slugger has 16 home runs, tied with teammate Ben Rice for second in the American League, but has been streaky with the bat. Judge is only batting .250 on the year and is 1 for his last 19. He’s batting .247 in May after a slightly better .275 in April in what’s easily been the most up-and-down season of his career.

Worse yet, Aaron Judge’s signature power has disappeared along with his swing. He hasn’t hit a home run in ten straight games, something that hasn’t happened since April 5-15…of last year. By comparison, Judge hit .415 in April and .364 in May last season and overcame slumps in the summer to still win the AL batting title at .331.

That almost makes Judge’s current slump look doubly worse, being both the reigning MVP and batting champion. Even stranger is his wRC+ this season is still a robust 159 despite his K% jumping nearly six points to 29.3%, which can be attributed to Judge taking more swings outside the strike zone. His O-Swing%, which measures exactly that, is up to 25.9% from 22.5% last year. The culprit here is simpler: per Savant, Judge is having a harder time with breaking and offspeed pitches.

We’ve seen it ever since he debuted in 2016. If Aaron Judge, the heart and soul of the team, is slumping? So does the rest of the lineup. He is the engine that makes this offense go at its best and strongest.

But, of course, that doesn’t mean Judge is solely the one to blame. Giancarlo Stanton and Jasson Dominguez both being on the injured list takes a lot of power off of the lineup card. Center fielder Trent Grisham batting .174 with a .181 BABIP despite plenty of hard contact doesn’t help either. Nor does Ben Rice being 4 for his last 26 and not drawing a walk in seven consecutive games.

Cody Bellinger is batting .310 in May, but .171 in his last ten games. And even that pales in comparison to Austin Wells looking just plain lost. The former Rookie of the Year finalist is batting .111 this month without any extra base hits and is striking out way too much.

This is almost like a bizarro version of the Yankees’ slide in 2024, when they were on a 9-18 slump headed into the All-Star Break. The problem then was the lineup was too top heavy. And remember, Anthony Volpe was the leadoff man for two months before he slumped and hit .220 in June.

The middle of the lineup, though? Non-existent. Anthony Rizzo barely hit above .100 in June before missing extended time with a broken arm. Gleyber Torres hit .218 that same month, and the shell of DJ LeMahieu hit .184.

It’s just the opposite problem today. The top of the Yankee lineup—Aaron Judge in particular—simply isn’t hitting well. That’s how baseball has always worked: the top of the lineup sets the pace and the middle and lower thirds follow. What are the Yankees supposed to do when that set pace is absent? It’s not as easy as “Next man up” or the team swinging or competing its way out of trouble.

What’s strange is that the Yankees, for all of their faults, still lead the AL with a 113 wRC+. The numbers also imply some positive regression on the way, especially for Grisham. In fact, the whole lineup is getting burned by BABIP.

But regardless of reasons, the Yankees now sit 4.5 games behind the first-place Tampa Bay Rays, who visit the Bronx this weekend. Now would be a great time for a turnaround, lest Yankees Twitter get even more impatient.

This lineup knows exactly how to fix itself, exactly what it has to do to improve. Let’s see the players step up and do it.