On Friday night, Aaron Judge, a five-time MLB All-Star, became the first New York Yankees player to hit three home runs in a contest twice in one season when he attached in the seventh inning against the Arizona Diamondbacks.
After New York’s 7-1 victory, Judge said, “it is incredible”.
“You see the list of players that have come through here, the retired numbers out there, but I just tried to do my job,” he said.
Judge hit a three-run homer in the third and a two-run shot in the fifth off rookie starter Brandon Pfaadt. He added his third homer of the night by getting the second deck in right field with a solo drive off Slade Cecconi.
Aaron Boone, the manager of the Yankees, said that Greatness doing special things.
“Those are things that, kind of the crazy things that happen, but it’s just a special player. Not surprising that he’s on that list,” Boone said.
After rounding the bases, Judge carried a curtain call from the Yankee Stadium audience of 39,143 as teammate Gleyber Torres stepped out of the batter’s box.
The judge said, It was great. Anytime Yankee fans want to show some love and appreciation, I love it. It was a pretty cool moment right there,” he added.
The reigning AL MVP became the sixth player in franchise history with multiple three-homer contests.
Lou Gehrig, who also hit four homers at Philadelphia in 1926 against the A’s, leads the Yankees with four such games. Alex Rodríguez and Joe DiMaggio had three, and Tony Lazzeri and Bobby Murcer had two apiece.
Judge also doubled during his second career three-homer contest — both reaching within the past month. He also drove in-depth three times on August 23 at home against Washington to assist the Yankees in preventing their first nine-game losing streak since 1982.
The first homer of Judge handed New York a 3-0 lead. Two batters after Pfaadt executed a mistake by misplaying Oswald Peraza’s soft comebacker, Judge lifted a first-pitch sinker into the Yankees’ bullpen in right-center.
His two-run drive to right-center in the fifth caused it 6-0.
Judge hit 62 home runs the previous season, smashing the last American League record of 61 set by former Yankees slugger Roger Maris in 1961.
