NY YANKEES: WHAT'S WRONG WITH AARON JUDGE?

NY YANKEES: WHAT'S WRONG WITH AARON JUDGE?

By: Matthew Blittner

A tale of two halves.

Yankees' slugger Aaron Judge has been both the best player and the worst player in baseball this season.

For the first-half of the season, Judge was the runaway AL Rookie-of-the-Year candidate and the presumptive favorite for the AL MVP Award.

In the second-half, Judge has been as pitiful as he was last season during his initial call-up to the Majors.

A first-half that saw him bat .329 with 30 home runs has given way to a second-half that has seen him hit just five home runs and see his batting average drop all the way to .289.

So, what has caused this abrupt drop in performance?

Many people have pointed to the so called, "curse of the home run derby," as a reason for Judge's second-half slide. After winning the derby down in Miami, many have speculated that it messed up Judge's swing, thus leading to the awful results we now see.

Others have pointed out that Judge has had nary a day off and is most probably exhausted and hitting the proverbial, "rookie wall."

Through all of this Judge has remained upbeat and has been putting in work with the Yankee hitting coaches, in an effort to snap out of his funk.

So, if he is putting in the work, then it is only logical to ask, why is he continuing to struggle? The simple answer is one that many have pointed out. He is too big to be an everyday player many have stated, but Miami's Giancarlo Stanton is nearly the same size as Judge and having a record-breaking season, so that can't be the reason.

To the naked eye, Judge is striking out at an increased rate, and is simply not hitting pitches that he was during the first-half.

Why is this?

YES Network broadcaster and former All-Star outfielder, Paul O'Neil pointed out a very precise issue with Judge during a recent broadcast.

According to O'Neil, Judge is dropping his back shoulder to an extreme extent. This is causing him to get under pitches and pop them up to the right side. It is also leading to him striking out more as he is chasing high fastballs. Being unable to get on top of these pitches, Judge is swinging under them and thus missing them all together.

One further point that O'Neil made, was that Judge is opening up on his swing to early, thus he is pulling off the ball and unable to cover the outside part of the plate.

This begs the question, if O'Neil, who is simply watching from the broadcast booth, can perfectly analyze what is wrong with Judge, then why can't his hitting coaches?

Who knows, but if Brian Cashman has anything to say about it, then the hitting coaches should be on notice that their jobs are not safe. This isn't the first time that a hitting coach has failed to fix the problems of the team's star player, and it won't be the last. But it is safe to say, in the words of the late-George Steinbrenner, "they should rent and not buy."

Let's hope that somebody fixes Judge soon, because the Yanks will continue to slide in the standings until he gets fixed, and he is just too talented to struggle forever.