Yankees Fans Should Have New Aaron Judge Appreciation Amid 2026 Triple Crown Race

Sometimes, you don't quite understand dominance until you're no longer seeing it every day.

The reasons to celebrate Aaron Judge and his accomplishments increase by the day for Yankees fans. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

The Triple Crown is an immortal achievement in Major League Baseball, and Yankees fans know that well.

Only 19 men in baseball history have led their league in batting average, home runs, and RBIs, and although we have better metrics for truly determining greatness today, no scrub has ever achieved these feats.

The rarity goes even further when you consider how long ago almost all of these occurred. Since Carl Yastrzemski's brilliant 1967 season with the Red Sox, only Miguel Cabrera has won the Triple Crown in a 60-year span, which makes the search for who comes next just as invigorating as home run chases or chasing .400.

This year, we have as good a chance as any to witness history, as the Astros' Yordan Alvarez is inching closer to baseball immortality with his incredible season, which will go down as tremendous regardless of how it finishes. We're witnessing his dominance firsthand, as he helped swing Tuesday night's loss to Houston with three hits, including a go-ahead RBI triple.

But as good as Alvarez has been this year, and as much as he will fully deserve MVP honors if he finishes this season healthy and effective, there's one big elephant in the room that's currently on the injured list, whose legacy might be being undersold because of stiffer competition in the years that he ruled the sport.

That elephant is three-time American League MVP Aaron Judge, who will likely never go down as a Triple Crown winner, but we should all appreciate him more for his dominance because of just how much he would've dwarfed Alvarez's 2026 season.

Yankees fans already appreciate Aaron Judge, and this year's Triple Crown race should only add to their love for him. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Yordan Alvarez's 2026 season puts him in rarified air

Entering Wednesday night, the Astros' superstar leads all of baseball in almost every single category, slashing .323/.438/.618 with 36 home runs, 91 RBIs, and a 196 OPS+ in 131 games. Of those six stats listed, only two of them have been surpassed by any other player in baseball, and that's the Reds' Sal Stewart, who has 99 RBIs, and Kyle Schwarber's 39 home runs.

Of course, the Triple Crown is solely predicated on an individual league, but Alvarez still has a chance to be just the sixth player since 1901 to win the Major League Triple Crown, an honor last bestowed on Mickey Mantle in 1956.

Dominance relative to your peers is the whole point of the era-adjusted stats that we use today, like wRC+ and OPS+, but there is something to say about the relative weakness of the American League this year if Alvarez's rather normal rate stats for an MVP-caliber season are pacing the league.

He's currently on pace for 44 home runs and 112 RBIs, an incredible sum that's usually towards the top of leaderboards every year, but totals that rarely lead an entire league. Only two players have led their respective league in home runs with fewer than 44 in the last 10 years: Fernando Tatis Jr. in 2021 (42) and Nolan Arenado in 2018 (38). The last time it happened in the AL was José Bautista in 2013. It's relatively unprecedented, and with only Junior Caminero and Ben Rice within five of him, it totally might be in that range.

As for RBIs, no player has led their respective league in RBIs with fewer than 110 since Darren Daulton in 1992, while only a handful have done it since with fewer than 115. Only two or three AL hitters may finish with triple digits, as the field behind Alvarez is quite small, as only Pete Alonso (89), Caminero (84), and Dillon Dingler (82) are even on pace for 100.

On a rate basis, Alvarez's season is one of the best in recent history, but his season will likely be defined by whether he can get into those hallowed halls, but it'll feel unjust if he gets to waltz in there, while Aaron Judge doesn't.

Aaron Judge's Dominance Gains New Light With Triple Crown Narrative

I'm going to read off Judge's four best seasons in the Triple Crown category. Scroll up to keep the Alvarez numbers in mind before you read this:

• 2017: .284 BA, 52 HR, 114 RBI
• 2022: .311 BA, 62 HR, 131 RBI
• 2024: .322 BA, 58 HR, 144 RBI
• 2025: .331 BA, 53 HR, 114 RBI

In all four of these seasons, Judge would beat Alvarez's pace totals in home runs and RBIs, while beating him in batting average (or being nearly identical) twice. The latter three seasons, which will go down as some of the best individual seasons by a clean player in recent history, didn't get a Triple Crown because of steeper competition.

Yordan Alvarez's Triple Crown case truly puts Aaron Judge's dominance into perspective. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Luis Arraez was the foil for Judge in 2022, as his contact acumen allowed him to lead the American League with a .316 batting average, narrowly edging Judge's 62-homer season. He won MVP nearly unanimously in a tough race with two-way extraordinaire Shohei Ohtani, but the Triple Crown eluded him.

In 2024, it was the all-around brilliance of Bobby Witt Jr., a young superstar who's got an outside chance of foiling Yordan's MVP dreams this season. In one of the best seasons by a shortstop in history, the 24-year-old Witt hit .332 for the upstart Royals to stave off another Triple Crown by Judge, but the Yankees' slugger won MVP unanimously.

Last season, as we can all recall, Judge had one of the most complete seasons by any superstar ever. He became the first player since Mickey Mantle to hit 50 home runs and win the batting title, flirting with .400 into mid-June while maintaining his elite power. Most other seasons, his RBI total (which isn't totally in his control) would be his foil, but he happened to run into a one-in-a-million season from Cal Raleigh, who bashed 60 home runs as a catcher and nearly cost Judge his third MVP.

Alvarez's competition is nowhere near the competition that Judge had in these three years. Even in batting average, where Alvarez beat Judge in 2022, his biggest competition is the highly erratic Chandler Simpson, who's hitting just .310. Further, Judge would usually lead all of baseball in these categories, which meant that he was not only being robbed of an AL Triple Crown, but an MLB Triple Crown.

It gets even crazier. Let's take that ridiculous 2024 season from Judge over his 2025 performance due to the more homers and RBIs. How does he fare against past Triple Crown winners?

• 2024 Aaron Judge: .322 BA, 58 HR, 144 RBIs
• 2012 Miguel Cabrera: .330 BA, 44 HR, 139 RBIs
• 1966 Frank Robinson: .316 BA, 49 HR, 122 RBIs
• 1956 Mickey Mantle: .353 BA, 52 HR, 130 RBIs (MLB Triple Crown)
• 1947 Ted Williams: .343 BA, 32 HR, 114 RBIs

Obviously, the run environment between eras changes, especially in the home run department, but Judge's apparent shortcomings in batting average lack context with how much the stat has plummeted over the decades. His batting average in 2024 was 79 points higher than the league average of .243. Compare that to the others:

• 2012 Cabrera: 75 points (.255)
• 1966 Robinson: 67 points (.249)
• 1956 Mantle: 95 points (.258)
• 1947 Williams: 81 points (.262)

You never truly realize greatness until it's in the rearview mirror, and although we hope Judge still has some dominance left in him when he returns from his rib ailment, the greatest peak most of us have ever seen from a Yankee may have concluded.

With Alvarez's chance populating the news cycle for the next five weeks, just keep in mind how dependent that result is on the environment around him, and how an injury to one hulking slugger opened a door that he himself was never able to walk through.

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