NEW YORK _ Aaron Judge was back on the injured list Friday after playing just one game. The Yankees slugger was diagnosed with a strained right calf for the second time in two weeks.
"It's just a reoccurrence of the (calf) strain that he had suffered before. Similar in that it's low grade and pretty minor, but enough that he had to go back on the IL," Yankees manager Aaron Boone said before Friday's doubleheader against the Mets. "Hopefully it's not something that keeps him down too long, but definitely something that we got to continue to work to get right."
Judge missed 10 days when he first had the issue, but Yankees GM Brian Cashman told fans on a Zoom call that the slugger would be on the IL "twice as long," this time, according to reports.
Judge spent much of that time trying to rehab quickly to get back as soon as he was eligible. He was playing in his first game coming off the IL when he felt the calf tighten up running to second in the Yankees loss to the Braves Wednesday. While Judge tried to play through it, Boone and his coaches in the dugout were quick to pull him out of the game, concerned about it getting worse.
Judge was reluctant to go on the IL when he initially felt the tightness in the calf, attributing it to the wear and tear of a four-day series on the artificial turf _ with concrete under it _ at Tropicana Field.
Judge has a long history of injuries and this is a sensitive subject with him. Boone said that made it all the more difficult to talk to him about it.
"It's always hard anytime a player has to go down or on (the) IL or can't play because of an injury. And then you couple the fact with Aaron, somebody who obviously is such a great player and is so important to our team," Boone said. "But the way he competes, the way he prepares, the way he goes about playing this game, I have so much respect for.
"I just hurt for him because obviously there's a lot of conversations around it, and I know how much he wants to be out there and how much he does to be out there, so it's another one of those cases where I just hurt for the individual."
As much as Judge wants to play, the Yankees need him to play right now. He is the ninth player on the IL for the Yankees, including All Stars like DJ LeMahieu, Giancarlo Stanton and Gleyber Torres. Friday, they were also without Gio Urshela, who Boone said was "day-to-day," with a bone spur in his right elbow.
Judge was powering the Yankees offense before he went down. He was slashing .292/.343/.738 with nine home runs in 71 plate appearances when the Yankees put him on the IL.
Friday, the Yankees had Brett Gardner, who was hitting .172, hitting third and Gary Sanchez, hitting .139, batting cleanup. The lineup shows the wear of not having its big bats. The Yankees have lost five games in a row for the first time since 2018 and in that span the offense has scored just 12 runs, hitting .181.
The Yankees also need Judge to find a way to stay in the lineup long term. It's been a struggle over the years.
Judge missed all of the first edition of spring training with what was eventually diagnosed as a fractured right rib and a partially collapsed lung. The four-month coronavirus pandemic shutdown allowed him to heal and he showed up for the rebooted spring training healthy _ though he did miss a few days with a stiff neck.
In 2019, Judge missed 54 games after straining his oblique in April. Of course in 2018, Judge lost most of the second half of the season to a fractured wrist. After hitting 25 homers and driving in 60 runs in the first 93 games of the season, he only played in 19 in the second half. He hit 2 homers and drove in seven runs.
In his three previous big league seasons, the 27-year-old has never had two healthy or strong halves. After hitting .329 with 30 homers in 84 games in the first half of 2017, Judge went to the All-Star Game and won the Home Run Derby, then immediately began to struggle. He was 1 for 21 in his first five games following the All-Star break and in his first 55 hit .185 with 11 homers and 84 strikeouts over 189 at-bats from July 14 to Sept. 12.
It was not until the next spring he admitted a shoulder injury that required offseason surgery had affected him.
