Chris McMonigle posited overnight that he might think about flipping Aaron Judge and Juan Soto in the Yankees lineup if Judge starts getting the “Barry Bonds treatment,” i.e. not getting pitched to given the weak lineup behind him.
Later, in the midday, BT & Sal Licata took it a step further: there’s already no reason to pitch to Judge.
“If you are an opponent of the Yankees, and you pitch to Aaron Judge, you need your head examined,” Sal said. “Seriously, make the case why anybody would. Again, the Mets drove me nuts last night, where Young walks Soto with a 10-run lead or whatever and then grooves one to Judge. Like, what do you think was gonna happen, you knucklehead? Any MLB pitcher with that big lead, sure, you throw strikes, but in a competitive game, why in the world would you ever pitch to Aaron Judge right now?”
Outside of ‘professional pride,’ yeah, BT had nothing.
“Outside of pride and challenging people and keeping the ball in play, whatever, but let me present something that kind of sides with you, too,” BT said. “Even in a non-competitive situation like last night, you pitch around the Aaron Judge most of the night and he doesn't really get any competitive swings in the batter's box – but then, somehow, the Yankees muster up a rally and now Aaron Judge is in the batter's box and it's a high leverage spot, and based on the situation, the Mets must pitch to him. Well, he's not exactly in the flow of the game!”
Ah, yes, the old lull him to sleep and hope he stays there routine!
“It almost seems like such a loser defeatist way to approach it, but it really does two things,” BT continued. “Number one, it doesn't let him beat you, but it also doesn't allow him to get into such a zone, because he's not really swinging the bat, and the one time that he's got to swing it late, if the Yankees mount the comeback, maybe he's not feeling good.”
“If I’m the opponent, until the Yankees prove that the guys behind Judge and Soto in the order can beat me, I am not giving them anything,” Sal replied. “I’ll go after Soto; if he homers or walks, so be it, but you saw it play out against the Mets – go get the next guys, and they did just that. But I’m not pitching to Judge, PERIOD. Because if you do, it’s going to result in runs.
They didn’t pitch to Bonds in 2004, I am not pitching to him.”
And no, it’s not because Sal doesn’t want to see greatness – he, too, wants to watch the best hitter in baseball do his thing – but it’s just solid strategy.
“If you’re an opponent, you’re an idiot if you throw Judge a pitch to hit. You are an absolute moron,” Sal said.
BT had an idea to move Alex Verdugo up to second and shift Soto and Judge down to 3-4 to try to heat up Verdugo and maybe lengthen the lineup…but does that actually let Judge maybe do more damage, as he suggests, or just mitigate Judge even more?
“Not opposed to that, because they need to do something, and that may be the only thing if not the easiest thing that they could do, but it does not fix the problem of once they get behind Judge,” Sal said. “Hypothetically, you might have to pitch to Judge with the bases loaded, but I personally would walk him and go after the rest of the guys, even in the first inning. You walk him, you walk in a run, but you pitch to him, you have a chance to give up four.”
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