How high can Aaron Judge climb in home run race after 300th HR?

Aaron Judge‘s influence on the game has reached a point where opposing managers are increasingly choosing to walk him, even in unconventional scenarios. This tactic underscores the Yankees slugger’s towering presence in baseball, a fact highlighted on the day he became the fastest player in history to reach 300 career home runs.

However, reaching 300 homers quickly doesn’t guarantee a path to career records. Aaron Judge hit this milestone in just 955 games, surpassing Ralph Kiner’s previous record of 1,087 games. Yet, Kiner’s career ended with 369 home runs, a reminder that early success doesn’t always lead to long-term dominance.

Aaron Judge is now the 162nd player to enter the 300-homer club. At 32, he’s entering what many consider the later stages of a baseball career, but he still has plenty of time to significantly add to his home run tally.

AARON JAMES JUDGE WITH HIS HR 300#RepBX #Yankees pic.twitter.com/AL6lP1USqa

— Pinstripes Nation (@pinstripesnat) August 15, 2024

Predicting Aaron Judge’s final home run total is more complex than for other power hitters who have reached this milestone. This challenge arises from the distinctive nature of his career path, which deviates from traditional patterns.

How far Aaron Judge can climb?

Aaron Judge made his major league debut relatively late, at age 24, on August 13, 2016, almost exactly eight years ago. He quickly made an impact, hitting a home run in his first game against Tampa Bay’s Matt Andriese, and another in his second game off Jake Odorizzi. Notably, his first homer came in his very first MLB at-bat, following a homer by teammate Tyler Austin in the same inning.

Despite this explosive start, Aaron Judge only added two more home runs in 2016, finishing his age-24 season with just four career homers. This late debut contrasts with many of baseball’s all-time greats, who often begin their careers much earlier, sometimes before turning 20. For example, by age 24, Eddie Mathews held the record with 190 home runs, closely followed by Alex Rodriguez (189) and Mel Ott (176). Even Babe Ruth, who was still transitioning to a full-time hitter at that age, had 49 home runs.

Aaron Judge’s unconventional career trajectory makes his achievements even more remarkable and complicates efforts to forecast his future based on historical comparisons.

His late entry into Major League Baseball has shaped a career marked by rapid catch-up, a journey that has seen him achieve significant milestones despite setbacks like injuries and the pandemic. Over the past eight years, Aaron Judge has sustained a remarkable home run pace, averaging 51 homers per 162 games—a rate established early in his career with a standout 52 home runs during his rookie season in 2017. This performance instantly drew parallels to Babe Ruth for the impact Aaron Judge had on the Yankees‘ lineup.

When speculating on Aaron Judge’s future, three critical factors come into play: his exceptional home run rate, his advancing age, and a key wildcard—his continuous evolution as an overall hitter, which shows no signs of abating.

Aaron Judge is currently signed with the Yankees on a nine-year, $360 million contract, extending through the 2031 season, when he will be 39 years old. To achieve a 20-year career span, he would need to play until age 43—a tall order for any athlete. While his superior athleticism, contrasting with the typical profile of a slower designated hitter, may enhance his longevity, it doesn’t ensure an extended playing career. A more conservative estimate suggests Aaron Judge might play out his current contract plus an additional two seasons, potentially extending his career until age 41—nine more seasons after 2024.

Given this projection and Aaron Judge’s current home run rate, we can use an adapted version of Bill James’ Favorite Toy method to forecast his future achievements. However, it’s crucial to recognize that standard statistical models may not fully capture the unique trajectory of his career.

Aaron Judge’s late start and extraordinary performance make his career an outlier, challenging the accuracy of conventional projection methods. His ongoing development as a hitter further complicates predictions, suggesting that traditional tools might underestimate his potential home run totals in the years ahead.

Using Bill James’ Favorite Toy method, adjusted to reflect Aaron Judge’s recent performance, offers a glimpse into his potential future home run totals. This tool, factoring in his age, estimates that the Yankees slugger has about 4.8 seasons left in his career. Based on his recent output—projected at 56 home runs for 2024, 37 in 2023, and a record-setting 62 in the American League in 2022—the method calculates his average home run rate at an impressive 50.7 per season.

If these figures hold, Aaron Judge could add approximately 243 home runs to his career total, bringing him to 556. This would place him ahead of Mickey Mantle‘s 536 home runs, securing second place on the Yankees’ all-time list, just behind Babe Ruth’s 659 home runs with New York.

However, applying this method to Aaron Judge’s career raises some questions. The projection of 4.8 remaining seasons appears conservative, especially considering his current contract and his performance trajectory. Additionally, while maintaining an average of over 50 home runs per season is remarkable, it may be difficult to sustain that pace as he ages.

Home run milestone	Probability
400	99%
500	80%
Surpass Mickey Mantle (536)	59%
600	35%
Surpass Babe Ruth’s Yankees total (659)	20%
700	13%
Surpass Barry Bonds (762)	4%
800	0%

What will be the best HR milestone for Aaron Judge?

An alternative approach, using standard aging models, provides a different perspective. Assuming Aaron Judge plays for nine more seasons and factoring in age-related decline in games played and home runs hit per game, this model projects him averaging 122 games and 41 home runs per season through age 41. By the final year of this projection, at age 41, Aaron Judge would likely hit 28 home runs in 98 games.

These projections underscore the difficulty in forecasting Aaron Judge’s future performance. His late start in the majors, coupled with his extraordinary recent success and ongoing improvement, makes his career trajectory unique. Traditional projection tools, while offering useful benchmarks, may not fully capture the potential of his future achievements, given the atypical path of his career.

Analyzing Aaron Judge’s potential for future home runs underscores his remarkable consistency, with an average of 51 homers per 162 games—a figure that stands out even among the sport’s elite. In 2023, despite being limited to just 106 games, Aaron Judge still managed to hit 37 home runs, highlighting his power and efficiency at the plate.

Projections based on age-related trends suggest that Aaron Judge could add as many as 419 home runs to his career total, potentially reaching 719 homers overall. While this estimate leans toward the optimistic, it factors in Judge’s steady performance and the possibility of a lengthy career.

When comparing different predictive models, such as Bill James’ Favorite Toy, which projects Aaron Judge to finish with 556 career home runs, and the age-based method, which posits 719 homers, a range of 243 to 406 additional home runs emerges. This range assumes that he remains in good health and continues to play at his current level.

Historically, only one player, Barry Bonds, has hit more than 388 home runs after turning 32, according to Baseball-Reference.com. Additionally, just nine players have managed to hit 243 or more home runs from age 33 onward, underscoring the ambitious nature of the higher-end projections for Aaron Judge.

Player	Homers after age 32	HR/162 through age 32
Barry Bonds	388	35
Hank Aaron	313	36
Nelson Cruz	307	32
Rafael Palmeiro	298	27
Babe Ruth	298	45
Andres Galarraga	261	21
Willie Mays	254	39
Mark McGwire	254	43
David Ortiz	252	36
Aaron Judge	?	51

The projection of 719 career home runs is particularly optimistic, hinging on the expectation that Aaron Judge can maintain his current level of play for many more seasons. A key factor supporting this outlook is his ongoing development as a hitter, even as he enters his early 30s.

Over the past three seasons, starting at age 30, Aaron Judge has increased his home run rate to 8.4%, up from 6.4% earlier in his career. This improvement is less about raw power and more about refining his ability to harness it effectively.

Aaron Judge has also made strides in plate discipline, reducing his strikeout rate from 31.6% through 2019 to 25.7% in subsequent seasons. This improvement is attributed to better swing decisions and enhanced command of the strike zone. Alongside these changes, his hard-hit rate has climbed, and he’s consistently getting the ball in the air more often.

These developments suggest that while the higher-end projections may seem ambitious, Aaron Judge’s continued growth as a hitter could lead to extraordinary late-career production, potentially rewriting what’s considered possible for a player of his profile.

Aaron Judge’s evolution as a hitter is evident in his performance over the past few seasons, showing he’s much more than just a home run slugger. Since 2021, he has maintained an impressive .300 batting average, a significant accomplishment in an era where such consistency is increasingly rare. With a current batting average of .333, Judge is in the running for the American League’s Triple Crown, leading in both home runs and RBIs while trailing Kansas City’s Bobby Witt Jr. by just 16 points in batting average.

While Aaron Judge’s towering home runs often steal the spotlight, it’s his overall hitting prowess that has led opposing teams to approach him with the same caution they once reserved for Barry Bonds. This well-rounded skill set makes predicting the Yankees captain’s future all the more complex, particularly since he continues to refine his game rather than showing signs of decline.

Although some may view the loftiest projections of Aaron Judge’s career, such as reaching 700 home runs, as ambitious, his diverse abilities at the plate make such outcomes more plausible, achieving such a milestone would demand sustained excellence throughout the latter part of his career. While it’s impossible to guarantee he’ll reach such heights, what’s certain is that the early phase of the Yankees slugger’s career has been nothing short of extraordinary.

Aaron Judge’s recent milestone—hitting his 300th home run in his 955th game—earns him a place among the 162 players who have achieved this feat. Yet, what truly distinguishes him is not just his power but his ability to pair it with a high batting average and improved plate discipline.

Regardless of where Aaron Judge’s final home run count lands, his career trajectory already sets him apart as a singular figure in baseball. His combination of power, precision, and consistent improvement ensures that Judge’s legacy is firmly cemented in the sport’s history.

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