TORONTO — Seeing Aaron Judge belt his 36th and 37th home runs in his 103rd game of the season Wednesday, Gerrit Cole had one thought.
“Can we get some padding at Dodger Stadium?” he later said wistfully.
Judge, of course, missed two months with a torn ligament in his right big toe from running into the right-field wall at Dodger Stadium to make a terrific catch on June 3.
There is no telling how different the Yankees’ season might have been if not for that play, but at least in Judge’s case, he might have been making a run at 60-plus home runs for the second straight year.
“It’s incredible,” manager Aaron Boone said after the Yankees’ 6-0 win over the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre. “I think I said to [hitting coach Sean Casey or bench coach Carlos Mendoza] after the second one, ‘That’s 37 [with] two months out.’ It’s remarkable to see. Kind of fitting that Aaron has that night on the night Gerrit probably locks up the Cy Young award. Pretty cool.
“Fun to watch two great players do their thing.”
Both of Judge’s blasts on Wednesday were two-run shots.
The first came off Jose Berrios before he took reliever Trevor Richards deep for his seventh multi-home run game of the year.
Judge, who has rebuffed a potential shutdown with the Yankees out of the playoff race despite being less than 100 percent healthy, is now tied for third in the American League in home runs.
The Yankees will have no lack of areas to address when they do their organizational deep dive this offseason.
One that certainly warrants a close look is the amount of injuries they have racked up in recent years.
The Yankees overhauled their strength and conditioning departments entering the 2020 season when they named Eric Cressey their director of health and player performance.
They indicated that his impact would be felt over time, but the Yankees entered Wednesday having had 29 players spend a combined 2,089 days on the injured list this season, per Spotrac — the third-most in the majors.
Some of those injuries, like Judge tearing that ligament in his toe and Anthony Rizzo having post-concussion syndrome after Fernando Tatis Jr. collided with him at first base, have been of the freakish variety.
Others have been the dreaded soft-tissue strains.
“Certain things you’re not going to be able to avoid,” Boone said. “A broken toe running into the wall is not, to me, breaking down. Soft-tissue things that happen sometimes are a result of that. Sometimes the makeup of a roster, having more veteran players — all things that go into that. That’s a much longer conversation.”
“It’s a little bit of everything. We’re constantly trying to be better at treating, evaluating, avoiding injuries. Obviously can’t avoid all things. But in a lot of ways, we’re better at it. We also have to actually show that and show that in the actual raw numbers, which aren’t in our favor.”
The Yankees are not alone in their injury woes this season, though they have not been able to respond to that adversity as well as some other teams have, part of the reason why they are missing the postseason.
Keynan Middleton (shoulder inflammation) threw a bullpen session on Wednesday and is likely going to meet the Yankees in Kansas City this weekend.
He could be activated off the IL to make an appearance before becoming a free agent this offseason.
“It kind of depends on what we need, how many innings we have available, that kind of thing,” Boone said. “So we’ll see. It’s possible though.”
Frankie Montas (shoulder surgery), meanwhile, also could come off the IL, perhaps to piggyback Clarke Schmidt and throw two or three innings on Saturday.
Boone paid tribute to Brooks Robinson, the former Orioles legend who died on Tuesday.
“Anyone that’s come in contact with him — [he had an] amazing grace to him,” Boone said. “Just really kind, nice, has given back a lot. He was actually my manager in a Pepsi All-Star game I was on in the winter one year. Just a really, really nice man. When you think of great defense, he’s one of the first guys that pops into your head. … Beloved in Baltimore, but throughout our baseball world, too.”