ARLINGTON, Texas \u2014 Aaron Judge is no stranger to showing up next to the all-time greats in the Yankees record book.<\/p>\n
Now he is bringing Ben Rice with him.<\/p>\n
Rice and Judge crushed back-to-back homers in the third inning Monday night, joining select Yankee company and providing the jet fuel for a 4-2 win over the Rangers at Globe Life Field.<\/p>\n
With Rice\u2019s 10th home run of the year and Judge\u2019s 11th, they became only the second pair of Yankees teammates to each hit 10-plus home runs in the team\u2019s first 29 games of a season, according to MLB.com\u2019s Sarah Langs. <\/p>\n
The other was Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle in 1956.<\/p>\n
Aaron Judge (99) and Ben Rice (r.) celebrate after a home run during the Yankees\u2019 April 27 win. IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m glad I don\u2019t have to face them, let\u2019s just put it that way,\u201d said Max Fried, who delivered six more shutout innings. \u201cThose are two of the best hitters in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jazz Chisholm Jr. also homered, continuing to heat up, as the Yankees (19-10) won for the ninth time in their past 10 games.<\/p>\n
Judge has had a few different wingmen over the years, including Giancarlo Stanton and Juan Soto, but now Rice looks like the latest as the two sluggers have been on a tear to start the season \u2014 their combined 21 home runs more than the Giants, Brewers, Mets and Red Sox each have as a team.<\/p>\n
Judge\u2019s long ball was just part of his big night, as he added a pair of doubles and was hit by a pitch, raising his OPS to 1.010 \u2014 which still trails Rice\u2019s 1.191, both in the top four of the majors.<\/p>\n
\u201cTremendous,\u201d manager Aaron Boone said of the duo. \u201cObviously Benny\u2019s off to an amazing start. Judgey\u2019s a ho-hum 11 homers already. Maybe his best game of at-bats tonight, where he\u2019s on all four times, stings two doubles, smokes the homer. It\u2019s a pretty good combo there.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
At least for a few minutes, Rice tied Judge for the team lead in homers when he crushed a two-run shot off Jack Leiter in the third inning. <\/p>\n
The first baseman went the other way for a 404-foot blast, showing impressive opposite-field power for his sixth home run in his past 11 games.<\/p>\n
Judge then one-upped Rice and clobbered a 414-footer at 113 mph off the bat, landing right around where his record-setting 62nd home run did in left field here in 2022.<\/p>\n
Aaron Judge reacts after hitting a double during the Yankees\u2019 April 27 win. Imagn Images<\/p>\n
\u201cMan, [Rice\u2019s] ball was pummeled,\u201d Boone said. \u201cThis is a ballpark, they\u2019ll tell you, it doesn\u2019t yield a lot of home runs. To hit a line drive into the bullpen the other way, impressive. The only thing more impressive was the [113] breaking ball that Judgey rifled into the seats right after him.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was a little bit of a, \u2018Hold [my] beer\u2019 moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rice said that after Judge got back to the dugout, the three-time AL MVP joked, \u201cI\u2019m not going to let Benny catch me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo just trying to keep him honest, keep him motivated,\u201d Rice said with a grin. \u201cHe\u2019s getting a little complacent, so.\u201d<\/p>\n
Max Fried throws a pitch during the Yankees\u2019 April 27 win. AP<\/p>\n
Judge said he has been most impressed by the consistency of Rice\u2019s at-bats.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s must-watch TV at this point,\u201d Judge said. \u201cBenny Rice has been our sparkplug all year and he\u2019s going to continue to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGo beyond the box score with the Bombers\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSign up for Inside the Yankees by Greg Joyce, exclusively on Sports+.\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\tThank you\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
An inning later, Chisholm joined the home run parade, swatting his third in the past five games \u2014 after going 23 games without one to start the year \u2014 to put the Yankees ahead 4-0, marking the third time in the last four games that the Yankees hit at least three home runs.<\/p>\n
That was plenty of support for Fried, who did not allow a run for the fourth time in seven starts this season.<\/p>\n
Coming off eight shutout innings against the Red Sox, Fried turned in six scoreless frames against the Rangers (14-15) in which he scattered four singles and two walks while striking out five. <\/p>\n
He also became the fourth straight Yankees starter to record a pickoff, which has only been done one other time in franchise history.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe worked really hard on it in spring training and we\u2019ve been executing well so far,\u201d Fried said. \u201cReally proud of them and I know they\u2019ve been taking it very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ARLINGTON, Texas \u2014 Aaron Judge is no stranger to showing up next to the all-time greats in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":684778,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2376],"tags":[106,5,731,108,4,1690,62,2548,2547,185,69,142],"class_list":{"0":"post-684777","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-ben-rice","11":"tag-max-fried","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-yankees","15":"tag-newyork","16":"tag-newyorkyankees","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-texas-rangers","19":"tag-yankees"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116480987867485443","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684777","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=684777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684777\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/684778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}