The New York Yankees are a dangerous team because of Aaron Judge, but on Opening Day, they proved they can be dangerous without him. Judge was in the lineup, looking to move on from the sting of an ugly WBC final outing.
He struck out multiple times in that contest, and in his first Yankees outing of the year, he was 0-5 with four strikeouts. Normally, that’d mean bad news for the Yankees, especially against NL Cy Young contender Logan Webb. This time, it didn’t.
Yankees bash Giants with no help from Aaron Judge
Aaron Judge might as well have not even been in the lineup last night. Slow starts are nothing out of the ordinary, as Judge tends to get hotter with the weather. It sometimes affects the New York Yankees’ offense, but not on Wednesday night.
Judge struck out in the first inning and again in the second inning after Trent Grisham tripled to push the Yanks to a five-run inning. Just making contact would’ve likely produced an RBI and given the team a 6-0 lead (though they didn’t need that ultimately), but Judge’s struggles continued.
Thanks to a well-rounded offensive performance that shockingly included zero home runs, the Yankees romped to a shutout win to start the season. Austin Wells had two hits, and everyone not named Judge recorded at least a base hit on Wednesday.
“This team led the league in runs scored last year, and we have a lot of the same guys back,” starter Max Fried said. “One through nine can beat you.” That was very much on display despite getting literally nothing from the reigning MVP.
Max Fried rolls
Max Fried was a big reason the Yankees won. He stymied the Giants all night, yielding just two hits across 6.2 shutout innings. One of the hits was a bloop single that put the go-ahead run on third base, but he bounced back to keep them off the scoreboard and rolled from there.
“It’s really a testament to just how good he is and how he can beat you in different ways,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “In some ways, it was a bit of a grind for him tonight, in and out of rhythm a little bit, but his arsenal is so vast, and he was a little effectively wild tonight.”
Fried started out rough, but he settled in once the Yankee bats got going. “Definitely was searching,” he said, “but when the guys go out there and put up five runs in the second, it allows you to take a deep breath and get into the game. When you have a five-run lead you have a little more room for error.”
Running it back works?
The Yankees surprisingly rested on their laurels in free agency. Instead of targeting upgrades, they brought back 24 of the 26 players who were on the ALDS-losing team. That’s rare for a team starved for a World Series title.
The Yankees were tied in record with the eventual AL champ Toronto Blue Jays, so they may have felt they were right there. Bringing back the same roster while adding Gerrit Cole (out in 2025 due to Tommy John) sometime in May could be enough to push them over the top.
Cole won the Cy Young in 2023 but missed half of 2024 with injuries, though he did help them get to the World Series, and he allowed one earned run in 12.1 innings of work. Adding him to the roster again should make this team slightly better than last year.
And that might be enough. Baseball can be hard to predict, but we’ve seen what this Yankees team looks like. And on Wednesday, we saw what it looks like without Aaron Judge hitting well. It was a scary sight for the AL.
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