Aaron Judge shows he’s ready to take on World in powerful spring debut

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TAMPA — It may be time to bubble wrap Aaron Judge until Opening Day, or at least until the World Baseball Classic.

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Making his Grapefruit League debut much earlier than normal, because he is leaving camp next week to captain Team USA in the WBC, the Yankees slugger wasted no time looking like he was in midseason form.

Judge crushed a pair of home runs Saturday afternoon at George M. Steinbrenner Field, delighting the sellout crowd early in a 20-3 win over the Tigers in the spring home opener.

“It’s spring training,” Judge deadpanned.

But this is unlike any spring that Judge has had before.

He is usually easing into fairly meaningless Grapefruit League exhibitions by the first week of March, but this year, he will be playing in high-stakes games with Team USA, with pool play set for March 6-10 and the knockout rounds to follow.

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“Even going back to last year, [I was] trying to get more at-bats early on so that I could be ready in April,” Judge said. “Felt like that worked out for us and I’m trying to do the same thing that we did last year.

“But also at the WBC, you don’t want to get exposed, man. You’re playing for your country so you got to be ready to go.”

Two years ago, Judge got off to a quiet start in April before turning red-hot the rest of the year, the opening month the only blemish on his dominant MVP campaign. So he came into camp last year with the goal of getting more exhibition at-bats under his belt, hoping that it would parlay into a stronger start.

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The result? Judge hit .427 with 10 home runs and a 1.282 OPS in March and April on the way to a second straight MVP.

Now, Judge’s ramp-up for the season is beginning even earlier, set to play again on Sunday against the Mets (as designated hitter), with Aaron Boone planning to start him in four or five games before he heads to Team USA’s camp next Sunday.

“It’s all about getting ready. But if I don’t get results, I get asked questions about what happened to the power. So I’m glad I don’t have to talk about that,” he said with a grin. “It’s about getting ready. At this point in my career, I got things I need to work on, things I need to do that are going to help us put the best team out there. I’ll figure out the results and stuff playing real games.”

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For proof that spring results don’t matter, Judge did not hit a single home run in the spring of 2024, before crushing 58 during the regular season.

But the Yankees, who are about to go two-plus weeks without seeing any of Judge’s at-bats up close, liked what they saw on Saturday.

After flying out in his first at-bat, Judge drilled a cutter at the bottom of the zone 420 feet to the batter’s eye in his second at-bat. And in his third, he turned on a 92 mph up-and-in fastball and smoked it 395 feet down the left-field line that he was somehow able to keep fair.

“Just some really good swings, good at-bats,” Boone said.

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Soon, Judge will be taking them for Team USA, getting to fulfill a longstanding goal by representing his country for the first time in his career. Besides wanting to win the WBC, he is not surprisingly looking at the tournament as a chance to get better by being around the best of the best.

“That’ll be the coolest part,” Judge said. “[There’s] very few chances — All-Star games you get an opportunity to be around the best players in the world, but this room’s going to be different. You got some of the best players in the U.S. all in one room. It’s going to be exciting, fun.

“Getting a chance to pick some guys’ brains a little bit and see how — more preparation. That’s the one thing I always look at any guy we get here is how do they prepare? How do you prepare to be great? All those guys in that room are going to be great, so it’ll be fun.”