{"id":590266,"date":"2026-02-24T14:23:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T14:23:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/590266\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T14:23:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T14:23:13","slug":"yankees-aaron-judge-eager-to-learn-from-usa-teammates-during-wbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/590266\/","title":{"rendered":"Yankees\u2019 Aaron Judge eager to learn from USA teammates during WBC"},"content":{"rendered":"

TAMPA \u2014 As Aaron Judge<\/a> discussed his first-time participation in the World Baseball Classic last week, the Yankees and Team USA captain<\/a> said he expects that sharing a clubhouse with other great players will be the best part of the international tournament.<\/p>\n

The back-to-back American League MVP has been in similar settings before as a seven-time All-Star, but Judge believes \u201cthis room is going to be different\u201d because of the patriotic fervor that motivates not only his team, but all the others in the WBC.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of people have a lot of pride for their country,\u201d said Judge, who has been trash-talking with some Yankees teammates who are playing for other nations. \u201cIt\u2019s great for baseball, great for the fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judge added that he is excited to pick the brains of other stars on Team USA, which is boasting its most stacked WBC roster yet. When asked if there was anyone in particular that he wanted to learn from, Judge told the Daily News that he has a few players in mind.<\/p>\n

He started off with Team USA\u2019s first baseman, Bryce Harper.<\/p>\n

\u201cHarper is a guy who\u2019s been in the league for so long and had success with multiple teams, multiple situations,\u201d Judge said of the former National and current Phillie, who also has multiple MVPs on his resum\u00e9. \u201cHe\u2019s definitely at the top of my list. I think he\u2019s gonna be hitting in front of me, so it\u2019ll be good to kind of pick his brain about what he looks for and what he tries to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judge couldn\u2019t stop at one player, though, as he also mentioned two center fielders: the Twins\u2019 Byron Buxton and the Cubs\u2019 Pete Crow-Armstrong.<\/p>\n

While Judge has mostly been a right fielder \u2014 he was the man in the middle of the Yankees\u2019 outfield in 2024 \u2014 he already finds defensive pointers from Bombers center fielder Trent Grisham helpful. Perhaps with some added advice from Buxton and PCA, Judge can join the trio in the Gold Glove club this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re two of the best center fielders in the game,\u201d said Judge, a talented defender in his own right. \u201cThat\u2019s one thing that\u2019s great about having Grisham, another one of the best center fielders in the game. Having him next to me to pick his brain, what he looks for, what he tries to train, what he does [helps], so Bux and those guys all kind of do the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judge will have plenty of others to talk shop with on Team USA, including, but certainly not limited to, Cy Young winners Paul Skenes and Tarik Skubal \u2014 the latter said he\u2019ll only make one WBC start on Monday \u2014 the recently retired and Hall of Fame-bound Clayton Kershaw, and 2025 AL MVP runner-up Cal Raleigh<\/a>.<\/p>\n

While Judge will also talk about life in the majors, leadership and family with other stars, he said he is most interested to see how they prepare.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the one thing I always look at any guy we get [with the Yankees],\u201d Judge said. \u201c\u2019How do you prepare to be great?\u2019 All those guys in that room are going to be great, so that\u2019ll be fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, Judge will try to give as much as he takes during the WBC. He just wants to make sure that he saves the best tips for his Yankees peers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m an open book,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you\u2019ve got questions for me, or you want to watch anything, see anything, I\u2019m here to grow the game. I won\u2019t give away all the top secrets. I usually save those for the Yankees, but I\u2019m here to help guys. That\u2019s what this game is about.\u201d<\/p>\n

A few of Judge\u2019s Yankees teammates will also briefly ditch the pinstripes for the stars and stripes, as first baseman Paul Goldschmidt and closer David Bednar are also playing<\/a> for the U.S. Meanwhile, former Yankee and current special advisor Andy Pettitte is going to serve as pitching coach under manager Mark DeRosa.<\/p>\n

Other Yankees playing in the WBC include Jazz Chisholm Jr. (Great Britain); Jos\u00e9 Caballero (Panama); Fernando Cruz and Elmer Rodr\u00edguez (Puerto Rico); and Camilo Doval, Austin Wells and Amed Rosario (Dominican Republic).<\/p>\n

With the Yankees\u2019 long list of WBC participants<\/a> expected to leave camp on March 1 \u2014 the tournament runs from March 5-17 \u2014 Judge can\u2019t wait to don a different uniform for a little while as Team USA looks to avenge its second-place finish to Japan in 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never had the opportunity to represent the USA,\u201d Judge said, \u201cand getting a chance to wear that across my chest is going to be pretty powerful.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TAMPA \u2014 As Aaron Judge discussed his first-time participation in the World Baseball Classic last week, the Yankees…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":590267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2376],"tags":[106,5,1207,4,1690,62,2548,2547,4819,4820,142],"class_list":{"0":"post-590266","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-yankees","8":"tag-aaron-judge","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-bryce-harper","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-yankees","14":"tag-newyork","15":"tag-newyorkyankees","16":"tag-team-usa","17":"tag-world-baseball-classic","18":"tag-yankees"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116126063449663251","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=590266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/590266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/590267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=590266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=590266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=590266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}