Saturday\u2019s 11-7 loss to the A\u2019s <\/a>at Sutter Health Park. \u201cBut I\u2019ve been seeing the highlights, seeing what they\u2019re doing. <\/p>\nIt\u2019s impressive, especially going up against Boston. They just won it, the former champs.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd for [the Knicks] to have a two-game lead, it\u2019s pretty impressive. They\u2019ve been up. They\u2019ve been down big. Come back with some great clutch plays at the end on the offensive side and defensive side. I wish we could catch a game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Judge met Jalen Brunson last year when Brunson threw out the ceremonial first pitch at a game in The Bronx. <\/p>\n
Arguably the two most popular athletes in New York talked on the field for several minutes, not enough time to truly get to know each other but enough time for Brunson to make an impression.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeems like a great guy,\u201d said Judge, who himself was a high school basketball star in Northern California. \u201cHe also had his whole family there, which I think speaks volumes about the type of person he is. He\u2019s a family man.<\/p>\n
![\"Aaron](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Aaron-Judge-1.jpg\")
Aaron Judge said he is impressed with Jalen Brunson\u2019s game, calling him a \u201cquiet assassin.\u201d AP<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was just cool, calm and collected on the field, which is kind of how he is out there on the basketball court.\u201d<\/p>\n
In some ways, Judge and Brunson are similar as players who established themselves as standouts before pushing themselves to a different echelon. <\/p>\n
Judge \u2014 an All-Star and Rookie of the Year in his second taste of the majors \u2014 essentially has eliminated any weakness from his game over the years and now is better compared with the legends from the past than his own contemporaries.<\/p>\n
The superstar, who hit two home runs in Saturday\u2019s loss, enters Sunday with the slash line triple crown, leading the majors in average (.396), on-base percentage (.486) and slugging percentage (.772). <\/p>\n
![\"Jalen](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Jalen-Brunson-3-2.jpg\")
Jalen Brunson Charles Wenzelberg \/ New York Post<\/p>\n
His 14 home runs and 37 RBIs are tops, too, as he tries to outdo his historic, 62 home runs in 2022 and an even more impressive 2024, which he finished with a 1.159 OPS.<\/p>\n
Brunson was a complementary player with the Mavericks, a second-round pick out of Villanova who worked his way from a bench piece to become Luka Doncic\u2019s wing man. <\/p>\n
He then signed with the Knicks in 2022 and unlocked a new level of stardom.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
This year, a former second banana has carried a formerly woebegone franchise past the Pistons and has threatened to do the unthinkable in knocking off the Celtics.<\/p>\n
The Clutch Player of the Year lifted the Knicks back from 20-point deficits in Games 1 and 2, with Brunson\u2019s free throws putting his team over the top in the second game.<\/p>\n
Entering Saturday\u2019s Game 3 \u2014 at which senior Yankees adviser Omar Minaya sat courtside \u2014 Brunson was averaging 29.4 points and 7.6 assists in eight playoff games.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a quiet assassin,\u201d Judge said of Brunson, who scored 27 points but struggled in the Knicks\u2019 Game 3 loss. \u201cHe goes out there, does his job. \u2026 It\u2019s pretty impressive to see and fun to watch, especially in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. \u2014 The captain of the Yankees wishes he could see more of the captain of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25168,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3768],"tags":[8250,7,288,304,1203,6,1136,191,8251,3810,3806,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-25167","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-knicks","8":"tag-aaron-judge","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-jalen-brunson","11":"tag-knicks","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-knicks","16":"tag-new-york-yankees","17":"tag-newyork","18":"tag-newyorkknicks","19":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114489108995717095","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25167","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25167"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25167\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25167"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25167"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25167"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}