Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic <\/p>\n
KANSAS CITY, Mo. \u2014 Seth Lugo still remembers the early days of Aaron Judge \u2014 the very early days.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Back in 2014, the then-Mets prospect was trying to conquer the High-A level and faced off against the Tampa Yankees and their 6-foot-7 outfielder.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHuge guy then, huge guy now,\u201d the now-Royals starting pitcher said Wednesday. \u201cYou could tell if you make a mistake, he\u2019s probably going to be ready for it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
A decade later, Judge is 32 and playing better than he did when he broke into the league at 24; better than when he established himself as a star and swatted 52 home runs at 25; arguably better than when he broke the Yankees\u2019 all-time, single-season record with 62 home runs in his age-30 season.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet again the larger-than-life star is making an early run at the record books and entered play with a majors-best 25 home runs, four in his past three games and a nonsensical .401\/.520\/.965 slash line in his past 41 games. <\/p>\n
Judge entered play leading Major League Baseball in home runs, OPS (1.149), doubles (25) and walks (55) and was tied for first in RBIs (with Jose Ramirez at 62).\u00a0<\/p>\n
How is a player in his ninth season and on the wrong side of 30 seemingly improving? The opposing clubhouse had theories.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think his swing has probably gotten shorter over the years,\u201d said Lugo, who faced a Judge-less Yankees lineup Monday and held Judge to 0-for-5 in their Subway Series days. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t miss mistakes as often.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
And he sees more pitches, which allows him a chance at seeing more mistakes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s gotten smarter, understands what the league\u2019s doing to him \u2014 or trying to do him,\u201d Lugo said before hosting the Yankees at Kauffman Stadium. \u201cIt\u2019s a game of learning.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
A few around the Royals echoed Lugo\u2019s thoughts. <\/p>\n
The 6-7 body and the mighty swing will always be Judge\u2019s dominant traits, but several cited an evolving knowledge of the strike zone and how pitchers will attack him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Royals reliever John Schreiber had yet to throw Judge a true mistake. <\/p>\n
The former Red Sox righty entered play holding Judge hitless in four at-bats, though Judge had walked twice.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Schreiber first faced off against Judge in 2019 and now sees a more disciplined hitter in the batter\u2019s box.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously he\u2019s gotten smarter. He\u2019s got a lot more experience,\u201d said the 30-year-old Schreiber who is in his sixth big-league season. \u201cHe\u2019s laying off pitches that he used to go after.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
According to FanGraphs, Judge entered play having swung at 16.5 percent of pitches outside the strike zone, which was third-best in the majors among qualified hitters.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It also was the best mark of his career and a significant improvement from his chasing habits (23.2 percent) in 2022, when he set the home run mark and finished with a majors-best 1.111 OPS \u2014 which is less than his 2024 OPS.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Everything about Judge is large, including his baseball IQ.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve seen too much of him,\u201d said Royals manager Matt Quatraro, who coached with the Rays from 2018-22. \u201cThis has only been one day I\u2019ve seen him this year, but the biggest thing that\u2019s evolved is his discipline at the plate to me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s very rarely out of the zone, especially when things are going well, and he\u2019s always been able to do damage. But he looks like he really understands the zone a lot now.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Judge, vying for his second MVP and perhaps a new home run record, might be putting himself in position for his first Triple Crown. <\/p>\n
He entered play at least tied for the league lead in home runs and RBIs and with a .309 batting average that was third-best in the American League.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Maybe a smarter Judge, with a career .284 average, has found one more avenue to improve.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe numbers speak for themselves,\u201d Schreiber said. \u201cHe\u2019s such a great hitter. He\u2019s so fun to watch when you\u2019re not playing him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic KANSAS CITY, Mo. \u2014 Seth Lugo still remembers the early days of Aaron Judge \u2014 the very early days.\u00a0 Back in 2014, the then-Mets prospect was trying to conquer the High-A level and faced off against the Tampa Yankees and their 6-foot-7 outfielder.\u00a0 \u201cHuge<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":119972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-119971","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119971"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119971\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":119973,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119971\/revisions\/119973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}