Aaron Judge’s slump, which shall remain unmentioned, risks dragging down the Yankees

In the strange, paranormal world known as spanking, where lucky socks or a borrowed bat are said to carry superpowers, there is one unwanted five-letter intruder who might as well be known as He Who Shall Not Be Named. Hitters don’t even like to use the word “slump,” no less recognize that such an enemy exists, and those are its negative forces.

“I’m not in a slump,” Prime Minister sensei Yogi Berra once said. “I just don’t hit.”

But at its worst, a breakdown is unmistakable, even if it is unspeakable. For Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees, it has become as big as the man himself. It cannot be ignored.

One of the great sluggers of this generation can’t get out of the way. He takes shots and swings at balls. He is late on fastballs and early on breaking pitches. He has struck out 19 times in 11 games this postseason while hitting .150.

Game 2 of the World Series on Saturday was a new low. Judge struck out three times on pitches outside the zone, only the 16th time in his career. The Yankees once again couldn’t survive without some positive energy from their captain, lost 4-2 to the Los Angeles Dodgers, falling two games to none in the series.

Judge never uttered the word “breakdown” after the match, as he parried several versions of the question: What the hell is wrong? He didn’t have to say it. Although responsible, Judge gave away one of the root causes of his breakdown by the number of times he used the same two words, emphasizing:

‘I certainly did must step up. I must do my job.”

“Especially with Gleyber (Torres) and what Juan (Soto) did at the top of the lineup, I must support them.”

“They will continue to come to base. I have must drive them in or move them.”

‘My boys keep picking me up, but so do I must come on and pick them up too.

“It’s clear and simple. I must start swinging on strikes.

“I have to.” It’s the telling admission of a batsman who is pressing. Judge knows how important he is to the Yankees. He knows at age 32 that he waited his professional career to get this opportunity to play in the World Series. And worse, he knows this October slump spans years. He’s stringing together a legacy of empty postseason at-bats that’s only getting harder to reverse.

In 55 postseason games, Judge is a career .199 hitter who is striking out 34% of his plate appearances, which is pretty much Mike Zunino’s regular season career. Judge has 85 whiffs – 12 more than anyone in postseason history through 55 games (the next closest is Cody Bellinger, 73).

Is there one factor, someone asked, that you can put your finger on?

“Just expand the zone,” he said. “You know, that’s what it really comes down to. You have to get a pitch in the zone and drive it. And if you don’t, don’t try to make something happen.”

It’s the obvious place to start. Judge chased pitches at a rate of 18.7% during the regular season, a career low. In the postseason this increased to 29.3%. He is 0-for-10 on 34 chase swings.

But it’s more than that. It’s mechanical. Manager Aaron Boone mentioned that Judge couldn’t get into his loading position in time to fire off a good swing. He has sometimes banged his feet in a slightly open stance and sometimes in the neutral stance that served him well in May, when he crawled out of his 35-game season opener.e breakdown. His swing is more uphill. He falls over the plate when he misses a pitch further out, a sign of a balance problem. Teammate Anthony Rizzo suspects a timing problem.

I had a specific pitch in mind for Game 2: a 2–0 fastball at 90 miles per hour Dodgers starter Yoshi Yamamoto that froze him in the sixth inning – when I asked Judge if he thought he should hit pitches.

“Yeah, 2-0, Yamamoto, I think it’s my third at-bat,” Judge said. ‘He built in a heating element for me. You know, if we’re doing well, we can shoot for that. Then the next pitch is a curveball where we make a mistake. I just need to have a little better swing on those two.

The valley Judge walks in today is so deep that Boone watched pop-ups for signs of life. He said before the game that a pop-up against reliever Blake Treinen in Game 1 had the makings of a turnaround for Judge.

“He threw me a four-sifter, kind of up and in, and I just missed it,” Judge said. “In that situation I would rather get the job done, but I felt better. But like I said, the bottom line is I have to get the job done.

‘We’re getting close. …I couldn’t transfer it to this game. You know, like I said, it comes down to being disciplined in my strike zone. That’s what put us in this position all year. So I just have to get back to that.”

Must. Also give credit to how well the Dodgers pitched Judge in the World Series. In Game 2, they threw Judge 21 pitches. Only twice did they double up on the same pitch within an at-bat – and each time Judge was fooled into striking out on a chase swing.

Here’s how Yamamoto Judge pitched in terms of velocity variation from pitch to pitch:

First strike, starting at 96 mph: -16, +17, -10, -8, -7, -1.

Second turn, starting at 80 mph: -5, +21, -10, +9.

Third strike, starting at 95 mph: -6, +5, -18, +16.

That’s an excellent performance at changing speeds.

Judge is the kind of impactful hitter who is always just one strike away. For example, he broke his April slump with a May 5 homer off Tarik Skubal in his first at-bat when he straightened his feet.

“You have to make your plate this big,” said teammate Giancarlo Stanton, holding his hands together roughly in the shape of a hamburger. “You feel like your plate is so big,” he pushed his hands far apart, “and all you have to do is squeeze it together. No, it’s not mechanical. He’s going to help us win games here.”

Time and opportunity begin to slip away. Judge has 55 games of postseason pressure on his shoulders. His team faces a true must-win Game 3 on Monday. He is one of the game’s truly great sluggers and the emotional center of this team. He has must do something, and quickly. And isn’t that how we got here, in the land of the unspeakable?