Aaron Judge Injury Update: Yankees Slugger Playing Catch, Return Possible in Early September
Aaron Judge is running. Aaron Judge is playing catch. Aaron Judge is not back yet.
The Yankees captain reached a real milestone in his recovery from a right rib stress fracture on Saturday, participating in some baseball activities before the team’s game against the Blue Jays in Toronto. Judge played catch on the field and ran the bases at low intensity. That is the first time the fanbase has seen him doing anything remotely baseball-related in weeks.
Judge went on the injured list on May 31 and has been progressing slowly through a stress fracture recovery. Manager Aaron Boone told reporters this weekend that he expects Judge could be cleared for a return in about a month. Fox insider Ken Rosenthal reported that the best case scenario is a return to game action by late August or early September.
What This Means for the Yankees
The Yankees are hanging on in the AL East. Their record without Judge has been serviceable, but their run differential has cratered. This is exactly the kind of team that needs a healthy Judge back before the playoffs to have any real World Series chance.
Every other AL contender is watching the Yankees’ situation. Boston, Toronto, Houston, and Detroit all know that a Yankees team with a healthy Judge is a different playoff opponent than a Yankees team without him. That gap matters when you are constructing your own roster deadline moves.
Brian Cashman was aggressive at the trade deadline, adding pitching help and some depth. Those moves were made under the assumption Judge would return. If he does not, the whole calculus changes. The Yankees could go from a legitimate contender to a wild card team that gets bounced in the first round.
Judge Himself Is Confident
Judge told reporters over the weekend that he will be back this season. That is not new. He has been saying that from the day he went on the IL. What is different now is that the physical progress backs it up.
Rib injuries are unpredictable. They heal on their own timeline, and there is not a lot medicine can do to accelerate them. Judge has been in the training room every day, doing what he can, and waiting for his body to catch up.
The concern with any return is that Judge is a big guy. He generates massive torque with his swing, and his throws from the outfield are cannons that put stress on his entire torso. Coming back too early risks re-injury, and re-injuring a rib stress fracture can mean season-ending recovery.
How Boone Handles This
Boone has to decide how much to rush the process. The Yankees need Judge, but they also need him healthy for October. That balance is the tension every manager faces with a star player returning from injury.
The most likely path is a minor league rehab assignment in the last week of August, followed by a return to the Yankees lineup right around September 1. That gives Judge a month of regular season action to get his timing back before the playoffs.
He will not be at 100 percent right away. Judge himself has said publicly that he expects some at-bats will feel weird for a while. That is normal. The question is whether he is impactful enough on his worst days to be a difference-maker in his best games.
The Playoff Picture
New York is currently in the wild card mix. That is not where this franchise expects to be. A healthy Judge changes the calculus of every playoff series they might play in. His presence in the lineup makes the pitchers around him better because opposing managers have to pitch differently to Anthony Volpe, Giancarlo Stanton, and everyone else.
The Yankees have three weeks to hold their spot and get Judge back on the field. If both things happen, they are legitimately dangerous in October. If either falls apart, this season is going to be remembered for very different reasons.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
