New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge says he is “game-ready”

Aaron Judge has had to deal with all kinds of rumors in the last few months. People said he wouldn’t be ready on time to help the New York Yankees in their quest for their 28th title, and other talked about other non-baseball issues going on in his life. It’s all in the past now: the only thing that matters is that he already returned to the field for an intrasquad game and he is going to be ready to contribute when the season starts on July 23.

His motto for this short season is four months to wear a mask, wash your hands and take a shot at winning the World Series, per MLB.com. That is the message Judge has been spreading around Yankees teammates.

“There’s a lot of rules and regulations about you can’t do this, you can’t do that,” Judge said on Monday. “That’s kind of what we talked to the team about: ‘Fellas, we’ve got four months of locking it in.’

“Four months to go through everything in the procedures to keep everybody safe. Hold off on going out or going to places; be smart. We’ve got four months to win a championship and we want everybody on the field. You can spit, do sunflower seeds and go out to a restaurant once this is all over.”

He trusts the Yankees to keep everybody safe

For what is worth, Judge never entertained the idea of sitting out the season, although he says he understand the risks of playing sports during the pandemic. But he trusts MLB and the New York Yankees to successfully keep players safe.

“There’s obviously a risk with anything,” the Yankees’ star said. “Walking outside, there’s a risk. Leaving your apartment, there’s a risk. There’s risk everywhere, but I love this game and I love the team that we’ve got here and the opportunity we have here. Even though it’s 60 games, I just can’t wait to get it started.”

Judge, who spent months rehabbing a broken rib, faced Gerrit Cole in a simulated game last week, and participated on Monday’s intrasquad game. There, he took at-bats against Clarke Schmidt and Chad Green. And, although he didn’t have a hit, he saw the ball well.

“We’ve got a pretty tough pitching staff out there,” Judge said. “These next couple weeks are going to be tough, but we’re looking forward to it. You want to face the best and we’ve got the best. It’s going to be a fun couple of weeks.”

“It feels good to be back on the field,” Judge said. “I kept inching, trying to push them on the regimen a little bit on what we could do because my body was feeling great and I knew we had limited time to get ready for the season.”

The Washington Nationals better be ready for Judge, as the New York Yankees’ right fielder sure will ready for them.

“I’m game-ready,” Judge said. “Like I told you guys in Spring Training, I was going to be ready for Opening Day, so I’m feeling good. The biggest thing now is just getting the reps because I’ve missed so many at-bats. I didn’t get all the reps in the outfield, reps on the bases. For me right now, it’s just getting my timing back in the game and getting my game reps to go out there for 60 games.”