Aaron Judge’s quest for history took a big stride on Tuesday night.
Facing the Red Sox at Fenway Park, Judge hit two game-tying solo homers—one in the sixth inning and one in the eighth—to push his season total to 57. That puts him four shy of Roger Maris’s American League record of 61 homers in 1961.
Judge’s first blast came on the first pitch he saw from Red Sox starter Nick Pivetta, which he hit over the right field wall. Statcast measured its exit velocity at 109.7 miles per hour. His second homer came off of Garrett Whitlock, when Judge pulled a 1–1 pitch over the Green Monster.
This marked Judge’s 10th multi-homer game of the season, tying him for second-most in AL history and putting him one behind Hank Greenberg, who hit 11 multi-homer games in 1938, per James Smyth of YES Network.
In a historically great year, Judge has somehow been even more dominant of late. In 49 games since the All-Star break, the 6’7” slugger is batting .363/.500/.836 with 24 home runs. He leads the majors in home runs, runs scored (116), RBIs (123), OPS (1.106) and total bases (352).
The Yankees went on to win 7–6 in 10 innings, pushing their lead in the AL East to six games over the Blue Jays.
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