Case Closed: The Aaron Judge Legacy

From one captain to another, the continuation of a baseball legacy. (AP)

As a Yankees fan, my baseball experiences have always been connected by greatness. Two of my most endearing Yankees memories involve shockingly similar situations. Both games were at Yankee Stadium, with the Rays in town as the visiting team. Both games took place in the summer, with those long baseball days and nights that seem never ending. Both memories occurred at the start of each game, before fans had a chance to settle into the action. Both moments involved a first inning home run to right field, touching off some of the loudest cheers I’ve heard in the Bronx. Most importantly, both memories involved two players who have been, are, and will forever be essential components of the fabric of Yankees history. 

On July 27, 2013, I attended a Sunday matinee at the Stadium with my dad. It was a battle between a first place and a fourth place team, but shockingly, the Yankees were the team in fourth on this day. The 2013 season had been a rough one - injuries and poor performance left the team 9 games behind Tampa, looking to avoid a sweep. Although the 2013 Yankees were mediocre at best, this game was a throwback to a better era. A pregame ceremony to celebrate Hideki Matsui set the tone, and newly reacquired Alfonso Soriano was the unquestioned star, homering and ending the game with a walkoff single. However, the highlight of the game, and perhaps one of the best moments I’ve seen at Yankee Stadium came in the top of the first. For context, I’ll turn it over to my 17 year old self, running his own amateur Yankees blog at the time and reflecting on his chance to see greatness in person. 

“It was almost a year ago that I experienced my Derek Jeter moment. I suppose we’re all allotted one for our lifetime, the lucky ones may even get two. I got just this one, on a Sunday afternoon game against the Tampa Bay Rays. It was Hideki Matsui Bobblehead and Retirement Ceremony day, so the game already had a special feel to it. It became even more special when Jeter stepped up in the bottom of the first inning. It was his first at bat back from his second disabled list stint of the year. As he stepped into the box against Matt Moore, the crowd was hoping for something good. The cheers got louder and louder as Moore entered the windup. As he released the ball, two words slammed against the summer air over and over, “DEREK JETER. DEREK JETER.”

Jeter turned on the pitch and drove it the opposite way, classic Jeter style. The ball kept carrying and carrying. Finally the crowd cheer reached a peak at which I have never heard them cheer. Not when I went to Game 1 of the 2009 World Series. Not when I had attended countless games over the years. Not when the Yankees had locked down any win that I had seen. We cheered. Cheered as the ball landed over the fence. Cheered as Jeter rounded the bases. Cheered as he returned to the dugout, then came back out for a curtain call. The noise meter was broken by the time the cheering had subsided. It was a crazy, magical, special, insane moment.”

Nine years later, I was back at the Stadium to see Yankees vs. Rays. This time, the Yankees were the team in front by a staggering 10 games. I had gone through high school, graduated college, and was preparing to enter law school. Derek Jeter was retired and a Hall of Famer. No one from the 2013 team was on the active roster. So much had changed, and yet, so much remained the same. In the bottom of the first, in stepped Aaron Judge against Shane McClanahan. I had been watching Judge for six years, but had yet to experience an “Oh shit, Aaron Judge” moment in person. I had only seen him homer once, a garbage time blast over the Green Monster off of Eduardo Rodriguez when the Yankees were down 6-0. That was 2021 Aaron Judge, but this Judge was different. He had already hit 24 home runs barely two months into the season and the MVP buzz was already in full force. As fans settled into their seats, Judge worked the count full, and then on a 3-2 pitch, I got my Aaron Judge moment.

Jeter to Judge, one captain to another, nine years apart, hitting bombs into the right field bleachers and circling the bases to the roar of the crowd. So much had changed but yet, the feeling was the same. It felt special. It felt right.

For those of us born in the late 1990s, we came of age in the Derek Jeter era. I was too young to remember the 1996-2000 Yankees, but I was indoctrinated into the Jeter-led cult that they began. My first Yankees memories are of Derek Jeter as the established veteran, the proven champion, The Captain. In 2009, I was hooked as Jeter dipped into the fountain of youth to help lead the Yankees back to the promised land. Seeing him fall off in 2010 was disconcerting, but his 2011-2012 renaissance was truly a magical experience. I believed that this man would play baseball forever and until he collapsed on the field in the 2012 ALCS, he probably believed that too. After that, the end came quickly. The moment I witnessed in 2013 was perhaps his sole highlight from that year and in 2014, the victory lap was more about looking back than living in the present. Just like Tony Soprano, I got the feeling that I came in at the end. That the best was over.

In 2013, merely a month before I witnessed Jeter magic in the Bronx, the Yankees drafted a young outfielder from Northern California. Usually watching the MLB draft is an exercise in speculation, in looking at a name and a face and hoping that this unknown rookie could be a difference maker in half a decade’s time. Before 2013, I had never really put much stock into draft picks. Aaron Judge changed that. Aaron Judge was the kind of prospect that made you dream, not because you knew he was going to be a superstar, but because he was such a physical anomaly. Standing 6’6” and adorned in a Yankees jersey large enough to fit his massive frame, Judge was in attendance in the MLB Draft Room in Secaucus, New Jersey. I still remember watching this on TV and being in awe of this mountain of a man. Something about him seemed different. I remember Aaron Judge for being the first baseball prospect I actually hoped would be good, not even for the sake of the Yankees but for the sake of watching this Paul Bunyan figure swat home runs in pinstripes.

The 2017 season was magical for many reasons, but Aaron Judge taking the league by storm was the greatest of those reasons. For the first time, Yankees fans of my generation were seeing a highly touted prospect come up and surpass expectations. Watching a young superstar carry a team to the postseason and immediately felt extremely Jeterian. Over the next five years, Judge became the central figure of the Yankees. In 2022, he took his greatness to new heights. This was the Derek Jeter figure of a new generation. He was our guy and we all hoped that Judge would stay in pinstripes forever. We had never seen anything like this before.

Except, we had actually seen this before. It all felt too familiar.

Robinson Cano was supposed to be this. His rookie season of 2005 came as Derek Jeter crossed the line from young stud to veteran leader. In Yankee-land, there is always a seamless handoff between legends. Ruth to Gehrig to DiMaggio to Mantle came as fluidly as possible. Bobby Murcer picked up the slack from there, then passed it to Thurman Munson and Reggie Jackson in the 1970s. A young first baseman named Don Mattingly took it from there and carried the torch right through the Jeter years. Robinson Cano was the next generation, the man who would carry the Yankees as their leader until the next star arose from Scranton.

In December 2013, those dreams died on the vine as Cano left to play for the Seattle Mariners. The Yankees never budged above their 7 year, $175 million offer and Cano’s demands of a contract in excess of $300 million showed that there was an impasse that never was close to being resolved. In Seattle, Cano faded into obscurity. Not even a mid contract trade to the Mets could save him, as a PED suspension and 0 playoff appearances signaled a death knell for his time as a star. Similarly, the Yankees had a lineup without an anchor and in a completely unfamiliar position for them. Over the next three years, they averaged 85 wins and one postseason game. It was a lineup of role players, of stars past their prime and missing that one central piece that makes the Yankees the Yankees: the homegrown talent.

In December 2022, we seemed to be careening down an identical path. Aaron Judge found himself in the same position as Robinson Cano did nine years ago and faced a choice. Did he want to follow the Jeter path and become a Yankee legend for life, the next captain and an inner circle franchise great? Or did he want to follow the Cano path out west, to become the face of the San Francisco Giants and face an uncertain future in the annals of MLB history? The Yankees also faced a crossroads. Were they going to let their homegrown star walk again and plunge their team back into uncertainty or would they compensate Judge at the level which they refused to go to for Cano?

Despite Jon Heyman’s best attempts, in the end Judge and the Yankees sealed the deal that had slipped away many years ago with Cano. They both knew they needed each other. In many ways, Hal Steinbrenner and Aaron Judge both learned from previous mistakes. Steinbrenner ponied up with a contract offer for Judge than almost surpassed the combined monetary value of Jeter’s and Cano’s contracts. In turn, Judge made the choice to become a Jeter, not a Cano. In a way, he is better than both of them combined. He carries himself in the same way as Jeter but plays at a level that far surpasses anything #2 or #24 ever did on the field. With his new contract, Judge made himself a Yankee-the Yankee- for life and has sealed his legacy. He has become Jeterian not only in spirit, but in title - as the newest captain of the most prestigious franchise in sports.

In that aforementioned Jeter article, I took a stab at trying to articulate what made Jeter Jeter. It certainly wasn’t the on field success or even the winning. It was something greater than that, something which I tried to articulate here:

“Then I realized what it was. It was because he was a Yankee. I’m not saying that the Yankees deserve any special privilege in public standing. However, there have been so many great ideals and people associated with the Yankees that it’s hard not to romanticize them. Jeter is the ultimate Yankee. On the team in the public eye, in the city that never sleeps, with the scrutiny of millions of people on him, he has delivered for them time and time again. That’s what makes him so special. He has a good work ethic, a gracious and humble personality, and a charismatic way about him. He doesn’t just play for the Yankees. He is a Yankee.”

Did I buy into the Jeter Kool Aid a bit? Perhaps. But that’s the point, isn’t it? The signature aspect of the Yankees isn’t the winning, it’s the mythic ideology associated with generations of talent who feel privileged to comport themselves a certain way. Any baseball team can play well, but when the Yankees play well, it means something more. It’s a set of values that the players can believe in, that the fans can believe in. It inspires young players like Aaron Judge to mold themselves into the next version of Derek Jeter, to see the example that the Captain set and to follow in his footsteps. Perhaps there is a young player in the minors right now (Anthony Volpe?) who is inspired by Judge and continues the tradition. I almost guarantee this will happen. If Judge had left, it would have shattered that continuity. The Yankees myth would be dead, a fate in some ways worse than the potential hit to the team’s on field chances. Unlike poor performance on the field, there’s no way to reclaim a shattered legacy once it’s gone.

Aaron Judge reached a peak in 2022 that Derek Jeter couldn’t dream of reaching. His MVP performance doesn’t do his season justice: this was one of the greatest seasons in MLB history by WAR and by most other metrics. Judge is Jeter leveled up: the player who can carry a team on his back and simultaneously be the most humble and soft spoken leader who commands the respect of his peers. Judge is obviously missing that pivotal ring on his finger, but the Yankees are well positioned to keep giving him chances to get one and hopefully more. In that respect, Judge is differentiating himself from Jeter: while Jeter found instant championship success, Judge has hit the wall of postseason failure over and over again. If and when he gets past it, it will be a more cathartic title than any of Jeter’s five. It will be the crowning achievement in a career that has already had many of them.  

In 2013 and 2022, I watched a former and future Yankees captain step into the box and capture 50,000 hearts and minds with one swing of the bat. Just like the Yankees franchise itself, my past and present selves were connected by these historic moments and historic players. I am closer to having kids of my own than to being a kid myself, but I am comforted by the fact that throughout life’s changes, the Yankees have stayed the same. Jeter and Judge set the tone in the box in each game I attended, but they have set the tone on and off the field in a far greater way.

Maybe in 2031, I will watch another yet to be determined Yankees star hit his own leadoff home run in a summer ball. Maybe one day, my son or daughter will do the same with a future Yankees legend. Maybe this player will be “their player”, the way that Derek Jeter was for the younger me and Aaron Judge is for children today.  I don’t know for certain who this future player will be, and when it will happen. However, I know one thing for sure: if it does, the player will have carried on the legacy that Aaron Judge carried on from Derek Jeter, and so on. Any other end to the Aaron Judge story would have severed that connection through generations of greatness that defines the New York Yankees and that fans have been so fortunate to watch throughout the history of the franchise. That is Aaron Judge’s legacy: the preservation of this connection that will live on past any of us, the connection that is the ethos of Yankees baseball.