5. Aaron Judge
Making contact in playoff games is one of the most difficult tasks in professional sports. The game has been changed by the new bullpen-management strategies that became the norm last October. Starters can now squeeze more max-effort pitches into five or six innings instead of attempting to stretch themselves out to pitch into the eighth. That’s bad news for most power hitters, and it is definitely bad news for New York Yankees rookie Aaron Judge.
Judge was the story of the baseball world in the first half of the season when he hit 30 of his 43 home runs and posted an OPS of 1.139. The rest of the league figured the big rookie out in the second half, and he has struck out in well over 40 percent of his official at-bats since the break. He has flashed the raw power from time to time, but it has been far more bust than boom for Judge.
In the second half, Judge has been abused with curveballs and sliders. He is hitting .079 off sliders and .133 against curveballs since the All-Star break. When Judge runs into a poorly-placed pitch, he’s probably hitting it 425 feet, but otherwise, he has provided a lot of free air conditioning.
Playoff arsenals will be heavy on the breaking stuff in the dirt to Judge, and teams may elect just to pitch around him. If the New York Yankees are able to come back to win the AL East or get past the Wild Card Game, Judge can still impact the game without hitting home runs.