Judge hits MLB-high 41st homer, Yankees beat Jays

NEW YORK — Aaron Judge launched his 41st home run, adding to his major league-leading total, and the New York Yankees beat the Toronto Blue Jays 8-3 on Saturday.

Anthony Volpe and No. 9 batter Trent Grisham also hit two-run shots off José Berríos to help Carlos Rodón (12-7) win his third consecutive start after going 0-5 in his previous six.

Volpe and Austin Wells each had an RBI single for the Yankees, who began the day tied with Baltimore atop the AL East after their five-game winning streak was snapped in the series opener Friday night. The Orioles were scheduled to play later in Cleveland.

New York entered having lost 16 of 22 home games for the first time since 1917.

Benched for not running hard out of the batter’s box on a single off the wall Friday, Yankees second baseman Gleyber Torres was back in the starting lineup as manager Aaron Boone promised. Torres went 1 for 4 with a single and a walk. He hustled into second base to beat a tag with a headfirst slide, and scored on Volpe’s home run that made it 6-1 in the fifth inning.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit a solo homer in the first for last-place Toronto and finished a triple shy of the cycle. He has nine home runs during a season-best 16-game hitting streak and five homers in 12 games against the Yankees this season.

Juan Soto singled on a 3-0 pitch in the first and Judge sent a 426-foot drive into the Blue Jays’ bullpen in left-center, giving him a major league-high 103 RBIs.

Judge also hit a two-run shot in the first inning Friday and has six home runs in his last eight games. He’s hit 16 longballs in the first inning, matching Babe Ruth (1927) for most by a Yankees player in one season — two behind the big league record set by Alex Rodríguez with Texas in 2001.

Before the game, Toronto manager John Schneider called Judge’s astounding numbers “comical” and said it was “tempting” to simply walk him every time up. So with two outs and nobody aboard in the second, and his team down 4-1, Schneider did walk the big slugger intentionally — drawing boos from the crowd of 40,218.

According to Major League Baseball, it was the earliest in a game that a hitter had been walked intentionally in that situation in the first two innings since 1972.

Faced with the same situation in the fourth, Toronto pitched to Judge and he struck out against Berríos (9-9).

After second baseman Spencer Horwitz flubbed a leadoff grounder in the second for an error, Grisham homered to make it 4-1. Grisham also went deep against Berríos in Toronto on June 27, when Berríos beat Rodón 9-2 and allowed just two hits over seven innings.

Rodón was hammered for 10 hits and a season-worst eight earned runs over five innings in that game. He fell behind 5-0 in the first and served up a pair of three-run homers to George Springer.

But this time, the left-hander struck out eight in 5 1/3 innings of three-hit ball, throwing 106 pitches on a 90-degree afternoon. Alejandro Kirk looped the first pitch from Jake Cousins for a two-run single, but New York’s bullpen held from there.

Clay Holmes struck out Springer with the bases loaded for his 23rd save in 31 chances.

New York has scored at least five runs in eight straight games, its longest streak since September 2021.

Blue Jays pitcher Kevin Gausman, who started Friday, was ejected by plate umpire Laz Diaz in the middle of the seventh for arguing balls and strikes from the bench.

TRAINER’S ROOM

Blue Jays: Springer was back in the lineup as the DH batting leadoff and went 0 for 4 with a walk. He exited Friday after fouling a pitch off his left shin. … Kirk started behind the plate and batted cleanup after missing the previous two games. He was hit on the left elbow by a 98 mph pitch Tuesday from Baltimore ace Corbin Burnes. Springer wore a shin guard and Kirk an elbow pad.

Yankees: 1B Anthony Rizzo (broken right forearm) has started swinging a bat. INF Jon Berti (left calf strain) is running at over 80%. There’s still no timetable for either player to return, Boone said, but Berti is closer than Rizzo. … RHP Ian Hamilton (right lat strain) is scheduled to throw a high-intensity bullpen Tuesday. … Judge was the DH as Giancarlo Stanton was rested.

UP NEXT

Yankees ace Gerrit Cole (3-2, 5.40 ERA) returns to the rotation in the series finale Sunday after missing a turn in Philadelphia because of body fatigue. Rookie RHP Yariel Rodríguez (1-4, 4.31) makes his 11th major league start for Toronto.