Aaron Judge on record pace after hitting 50th, 51st HRs

NEW YORK —  Yankees slugger Aaron Judge hit his 50th and 51st home runs of the season Sunday in a  10-3 win over the  Colorado Rockies, putting him on pace to break his own American League home run record. 

Home run No. 50 came off a 0-2 changeup from Austin Gomber in the first inning; it was Judge’s 18th homer in the first inning this season, matching Alex Rodriguez (2001) for the major league record.

Judge hit No. 51 in the seventh inning, following a solo homer from Juan Soto. Giancarlo Stanton homered in the next at-bat as the sluggers went back-to-back-to-back to give New York a 7-3 lead. 

Judge, who flew out in the second and walked in the fifth, took a curtain call after his second home run. 

“I didn’t want to come out until [manager Aaron Boone] told me,” Judge said. “He kind of gave me the look and the nod, so I went out there. The fans are pumped up. We kind of hit a lull there in the game. We scored, had the lead, they kind of came back. They were down one for a while and for us to explode there for a couple of runs, the fans were pumped up.”

It was the Judge’s 39th career multihomer game and fifth this season. The Yankees captain has seven homers in his last six games, 10 in his last 13 and 47 in his last 102. 

“It’s unreal,” Stanton said. “He does something special every day.”

The two homers Sunday put Judge on pace to hit 63 this season, which would break his AL record of 62 set in 2022. Judge first reached the 50-homer threshold in his rookie year in 2017, when had 52.

Judge also became just the fifth player to hit 50 home runs in three different seasons, joining Rodriguez, Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire and Babe Ruth.

“A great accomplishment but there’s still more to be done,” Judge said. “This team’s got a big mission in front of them and we’re all focused on that right now.”

Rodriguez had a pair of 50-homer seasons for Texas in 2001 and 2002 and hit 54 for the Yankees in 2007.

Sosa had four straight 50-homer seasons from 1998 to 2001, McGwire did the same from 1996 to 1999, including his 70-homer season in 1998. Ruth had back-to-back 50-homer seasons in 1920 and 1921 and 1927 and 1928 with the Yankees.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.