Aaron Judge can still rewrite his postseason history — but the Yankees are running out of time

NEW YORK – Aaron Judge is making history again, only this time in infamy.

After all the triumphs of his spectacular regular season, the Yankees slugger still had a troublesome history in his seventh career postseason, and in the first two games of the American League Division Series he hasn't done much to quell that history as much as he can not deliver in October.

Judge faced a familiar crowd for his first shot of the night on Monday: 48,034 fans were on their feet and screaming loudly as he entered the box. He was used to that this season, as he posted the most home runs (58), RBIs (144) and walks (133) in the major leagues. The scene in Game 2, where thousands wore his pinstriped No. 99 home jersey in the Bronx, was similar to the scene when he posted the best OPS (1.159) in baseball for the second time in his career this year. Even the situation he was approaching was recognizable and typically favorable: runners in first and second, no one out.

The only difference? It's the playoffs.

After two competitive at-bats from Gleyber Torres and Juan Soto in which each batter issued six-pitch walks against Royals ace Cole Ragans, Judge struck out on four pitches and took all the juice out of the building. Judge also had the worst strikeout rate (34.3%) in MLB postseason history among hitters with at least 200 plate appearances.

Judge drew a walk and reached on an infield single to end the night 1-3. He is off to a 1-7 start this postseason. When asked how he felt on the field after the Yankees' 4-2 loss to the Royals on Monday, Judge delivered a statement you may have heard from him before.

“If I don’t reach 1,000, I won’t feel good,” he said.

Judge added that he wasn't frustrated with his results and that he didn't think the Yankees' bye week messed up his timing at the plate, especially because he made sure to watch live pitching every day during The Bronx Bombers awaited Game 1 of the ALDS.

“I think you can look back in the season and find two of the 162 games that I'm aiming for as 1-on-6 or 1-on-7 or whatever,” Judge said.

But his results so far in two ALDS games have reminded us that this isn't the May when Judge hit 14 home runs in 28 games. This isn't June, when he raised his batting average to .409 and his on-base percentage to .514 in 25 incredible games. This isn't August, when he drove in 25 runs in 26 games while posting a 1.386 OPS. This is October, where his career slash line is .208/.311/.449 in 46 games.

With at least two games left in the Yankees season, Judge has at least a handful of at-bats left this week to pull himself out of this broad postseason slump. Maybe he can take solace in the fact that he's hardly the only big hitter to struggle in the playoffs. Far from it.

Barry Bonds batted .196 with a .618 OPS, striking out 20 times and recording just one home run in his first 27 career playoff games from 1990 to 2000. (He finally broke through in 2002 with an OPS of 1.559 while hitting eight home runs in 17 games.) Hall of Famer Willie Mays hit just one home run in his playoff career and posted an OPS of .668 – despite teams beating him during his 25th season Postseason games that spanned two decades, playing only one round in the postseason. Currently, Mookie Betts is hitless in his last 22 playoff at-bats. Bobby Witt Jr., Judge's presumptive AL MVP runner-up, is 0-for-10 with four strikeouts in this ALDS against the Yankees.

“You can never discount him,” Soto said of Judge. “He’s the greatest batsman of all time right now. He just does his thing. He had a little trouble with the fastball today. But I know he’ll bounce back.”

If the rest of his career is any indication, he will eventually.

In his MLB debut in 2016, Judge posted an incredible 44% strikeout rate in 27 games. After an offseason swing adjustment, Judge hit a record 52 home runs and won AL Rookie of the Year honors. In April this year he had a miserable start to the season. In his first 27 games, he posted a .178 batting average, a .674 OPS and four home runs. Five months later, he's on the verge of winning his second AL MVP award. But even in September, after struggling in the first three weeks and leaving the door open for Shohei Ohtani to win the home run title, Judge responded with home runs in five straight games and finished with the highest OPS+ (223) for a right-handed hitter of MLB history.

Judge likes to say this statement about reaching 1,000 because it's impossible to reach that number during a season or postseason, and to give us an idea of the goal – and pressure – he has set for himself. He will never stop making adjustments to continually improve his game. And it's not like it's the pressure or elite pitching in October that's bothering the hitter. Judge overcame the pressure of breaking Roger Maris' American League single-season home run record when he hit 62 in 2022. He won a $360 million contract by becoming captain of the Yankees and continuing to be the same great Batsman remained on the field.

“The great thing about the playoffs is that you play against the best every day,” Jazz Chisholm said. “And Judge is definitely one of the best. I think he enjoys competing against all these guys. I feel like it helps him mentally get into it because he's a competitor. We are all competitors, but he is the elite competitor. That’s why.” he does what he does.

So consider his postseason struggles as another part of his game that he's still improving; a narrative that he could soon turn on its head in dramatic fashion. New York faces Kansas City, with this best-of-five ALDS tied at one game apiece. Judge still has time to rewrite his October story. The Yankees' World Series hopes may depend on it.

Deesha Thosar is an MLB reporter for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. Deesha, the daughter of Indian immigrants, grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.

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