No, Aaron Judge is not the problem with the New York Yankees.

 

I know that I get very down on Brian Cashman on this site, and I really have to apologize. In fact, I think we all have to thank Mr. Cashman for not going into something like politics, where he would have been really, truly dangerous.

Compared to Cashman, Dick Nixon was an innocent waif, and Roy Cohn a piker.

With the New York sports world roasting The Brain over yet another, pathetic Yankees' playoff exit, Cashman managed to flip the script overnight, and shift the blame to the real culprit in the Yanks' awful October baseball this season: Aaron Judge.

Suddenly, a few innocuous comments that Judge made in the wake of the Bombers' latest flop have been blown up into a catastrophe the size of the Hindenburg.

What Judge dared to say was that, yes, the loss was disappointing. That the Yankees should go all-out to try to win the World Series. That he supported Aaron Boone, who he thought was a good manager, and that he supported his teammates.

Sorry, but I'm old enough to remember when ballplayers used to get chastised for knocking people—not saying, "Hey, fans, wish we had done better, hope we do better soon, and I support my manager and teammates."

Oh, the humanity!!!

The "controversy"—and as true controversies go, this one ranks somewhere around which wine to have with a good appetizer—was wholly manufactured within hours. And by guess who?

Oh, yes, it's The Great Deflector!

Suddenly, the New York Post, that soul of journalistic integrity, had an inside scoop saying that the Yankees' front office was upset by Judge's remarks. 

Gee, I wonder who their inside source could have been? 

Unfortunately, even some of the most astute NY sports commentators around fell for it, hook, line, and sinker. Sal Licata, usually so much fun to watch on SNY, was quickly braying that Judge had to be held "accountable!"

Accountable for what? Saying nice things about his teammates, manager, and the fans?  That war criminal!

Even so beloved an observer as the Venerable Keefe, after excoriating Cashman and Boone with one of his best columns yet, took the bait, with a wild denunciation of Judge that went all the way back to...2018, and his great crime of daring to taunt the Red Sox by playing "New York, New York" on a boombox, after the Yanks' one victory in the ALDS that year.

"Acting like the Yankees had accomplished something simply by splitting the first two games on the road [in 2018], the face of the franchise's foolish decision served as a rallying cry for the Red Sox, who had won the AL East over the Yankees by eight games that year,"Keefe fumed—even crediting it with inspiring the Sawx to knock off the Astros and the Dodgers later in the playoffs.

Stop it. 

Can we please dispense of the notion that bulletin-board quotes really help outstanding big-league teams win championships—particularly in baseball?

Funny, I seem to remember the Yanks starting an injured and confused Luis Severino—whose injury they had ignored for months, and who didn't seem to know what time the game was even starting—in Game 3 of that 2018 series, and watching him get hammered.

Funny, I seem to remember Giancarlo Stanton fanning in the ninth inning of Game 4 in that series, against a pitcher who could not find the plate with a satellite location system.

Funny, I seem to remember Gleyber Torres in that same ninth inning failing to beat out a groundball that was traveling slower than the No. 1 train in the 1970s.

But Keefe goes on to pummel Judge, writing that:

"The narrative that the Yankees have failed Judge throughout his career makes me cringe. Judge has failed himself. He's the on with a postseason OPS two hundred points lower than his regular-season OPS. He's the one who has played in 17 rounds of the postseason and played well in six of them."

This is mostly true. Aaron Judge does have and OPS 198 points lower in the playoffs than during the regular season, from an astonishing 1.020 to a mere .822. 

But the playoffs can be strange. An even greater player than Judge did even worse at the plate than he did in 8 playoff series, his regular OPS dropping from .940 to a mere .668. That man was Willie Mays.

As it happened, Judge hit .500 in 2025's combined playoffs, driving in 7 runs in as many games, and compiling a .600/.684/.933/1.618 slash line against Toronto, without teasing a single Blue Jay. Still didn't help. 

(And incidentally, in 2018? Judge's slash line against the Red Sox was .375/.444/.750/ 1.194, as opposed to Clutch Stanton's .222/.222/.222/.444. But, you know: teasing.)

But here we are arguing about Aaron Judge, who didn't even play in the 2026 playoffs—much less empower the Rays by playing a boombox equipped with a Kander & Ebb tune—while once again, The Great Deflector dodges all blame.

As he has done since what seems like time immemorial.

Wonder why the Yanks didn't sign David Ortiz when Minnesota released him? That was Old George's call. Why they signed Garry Sheffield over Vlad Guerrero, Sr.? George again. The cruel canning of Joe Torre? The Steinbrenners. 

Convincing Hal Steinbrenner that, "The playoffs are a crapshoot"? ("Uh, I never said that.")

Now Keefe repeats the suddenly circulating story that it was Aaron Judge who wanted the Yanks to bring in Verdugo and Rizzo, and hang on to LeMahieu. 

Right.

No doubt, if it suited his purposes, The Great Deflector could convince NY sportswriters that it was Aaron Judge who made the deals for Curt Blefary and Rich McKinney.

But say he did. Say Aaron Judge "wanted" the Yankees to make a dozen bad personnel moves. 

So what?

You think Ed Barrow hopped to when Babe Ruth said they should sign somebody? Think Joe DiMaggio used to dictate deals to George Weiss?  Or Reggie Jackson to Gabe Paul?

Not so long ago—well, actually, too long ago—The Great Deflector was strutting around New York, boasting about how he had faced down Derek Jeter at contract time, and that if Jeets didn't like it, why the Yankees would just bring in Troy Tulowitzki. 

Now Macho Cashman is helpless whenever Judge so much as looks sideways at him. Once again, The Great Deflector has stuck the blame for his own failings on someone else.

But again, I suppose we should be grateful. I mean, imagine if he were president!