4,000 years ago, the wooly mammoth vanished from the face of the earth. Standing over 11 feet tall and weighing six metric tons, the wooly mammoth is one of the largest, most recognizable prehistoric animals. Now scientists are working on resurrecting this one-of-a-kind beast. Although many think it will take several more years before the “mammophant”— a mix of a wooly mammoth and an elephant— comes to life, scientists may have already created this never-before-seen animal. His name: Aaron Judge.
Aaron Judge, standing at 6-7 282, is the definition of an animal, and he has taken the league by storm with his incredible power. He has seven home runs and fifteen RBI’s through eighteen games and is also hitting .281/.352/.672. Judge has an isolated power (ISO) of .391. The league average is .140.
It isn’t just his ability to consistently hit home runs in his first full season, but the way he is hitting them. He hit the second hardest home run recorded by Statcast this season at 115.6 mph and the sixth at 115.5 (three other players have hit a home run 115.6 mph). His average exit velocity is 94.08 mph, which is 6.43 mph faster than the league average and tenth in the MLB. Judge also hit the seventh longest home run this season in the MLB at 457 feet.
So how has Judge been so successful so early in his career. Well, it helps to be 6-7 282, but his incredible size is not the only reason why he has hit the ball extremely well this season. I previously wrote an article about Eric Thames’ power surge, and how his plate discipline, along with his strength, is the key factor in his incredible season. The same goes for Aaron Judge.
From last season to this season, Judge has decreased the percentage of pitches outside of the zone he has swung at from 34.9% to 20.4%. This shows that Judge is being significantly more patient this season than last season, waiting for his pitch to crush out of the park. Judge’s patience has resulted in more pitches in the zone, and he is making contact on a significantly higher percentage of such pitches in comparison to last season. Last season, Judge made contact on only 74.3% of pitches in the zone. This season, that number has jumped to 87.1%. Because of this, Judge has a swinging strike percentage of only 10.9% compared to 18.1% last season. More contact has allowed Judge to excel at the plate this season.
Aaron Judge’s approach at the plate this season has been excellent. He is waiting for his pitches and capitalizing when he gets it. Judge likes pitches up and in, and those are the pitches that he is swinging at. You can see in the heatmap below that on pitches up in the zone, the box is red, signaling a high swing percentage. Conversely, he is holding off on pitches low in the zone, hence the blue squares.
(Fangraphs)
From the heatmap below, although Judge has a high ISO on pitches all over the zone, the highest ISOs are towards the top of the zone and inside. Likewise, Judge has a higher average per pitch on pitches up and in.
Aaron Judge has made great strides as a hitter from last season to this season, and he is only getting started. Although his career just began, the verdict is in: Aaron Judge will be a force to be reckoned with in the Bronx for a very long time.