Just how impressive was Aaron Judge's 2022 season?

Issue #47

Aaron Judge was recently awarded the AL MVP Award, and I think deservedly so. He led the AL in runs (133), RBI (131), HR (62, new AL record), total bases (391), walks (111), OBP (.425), SLG (.686), OPS (1.111), and OPS+ (211). He also added 16 stolen bases vs. only 3 caught stealing, and his defense split between CF and RF was good (no errors all year in fact).

Yes, Shohei Ohtani is doing something that no one has done before—surpassing even Babe Ruth in terms of excelling as both a pitcher and hitter at the same time. (No doubt Ruth could have done as well or better back in the day if he'd had the option of hitting as a DH, but I digress.)

And yes, Ohtani's 2022 season in particular was very impressive, with stronger pitching than in 2021, though a bit less in some hitting categories. He won the AL MVP in 2021 over Vlad Guerrero, and you could certainly make a case for him as AL MVP in 2022 as well, but the difference between his main competition—Vlad in 2021 and Judge in 2022—is significant.

WAR

First off, if we look at WAR (using the version at Baseball-Reference), here are the numbers:

• 2021: Ohtani 9.0 vs. Vlad at 6.8

• 2022: Judge 10.6 vs. Ohtani 9.6

So according to WAR, Ohtani had a better 2022 than 2021, and I'd agree with that as his stellar pitching in 2022 truly made up for his lower HR and SB production from the prior year. But the difference between Judge in 2022 and Vlad in 2021 is even bigger.

Total Bases

But WAR isn't everything of course. I was impressed with Judge's 391 total bases, so I checked to see how long its been since someone had that many or more. I would not have guessed Derek Lee's 393 in 2005 was the answer. Aaron Judge this year had 177 hits, 28 doubles, 0 triples, and 62 HR. In 2005, Lee was the Cubs’ gold-glove 1B and had what was clearly his best season. He came in third in the NL MVP vote (behind Albert Pujols and Andruw Jones) after leading the league with 199 hits, 50 doubles, a .335 batting average, and a 174 OPS+. He added 3 triples and 46 HR to get that impressive 393 total bases, and also posted 120 Runs with 107 RBI. And similar to Judge in 2022, added 15 SB with 3 CS.

OPS+

Judge's 211 OPS+ also made me wonder: when was the last time someone had that kind of number? If you ignore Juan Soto's 217 OPS+ during the shortened 2020 season, then you have to go back to the crazy Barry Bonds years, such as 2004 when he posted a ridiculous 263 OPS+, 90 points higher than second place Albert Pujols' 173 that year. Bonds had several other high seasons like that, and Mark McGwire's 1998 season included a 216 OPS+. Jeff Bagwell managed a 213 OPS+ in 1994, but like that 2020 that was a shortened season.

Aside from shortened seasons, or players with a PED cloud around their numbers, you have to go all the way back to 1957 when Ted Williams had an OPS+ of 233 and Mickey Mantle had an OPS+ of 221. Willie McCovey came close to Judge's level in 1969 when he had a 209 OPS+.

Gap Between Top HR Hitters

What impressed me the most about Judge's numbers this year though was the gap between his AL record-breaking HR total and everyone else. For me, comparing a player's accomplishments against everyone else during the same season(s) is one of the best ways to measure greatness. In 2022, Judge's 62 HR were far ahead of the second best in the AL—Mike Trout's 40 HR. He was even 16 ahead of Kyle Schwarber's NL-leading 46 HR.

So how does that overall MLB gap of 16 compare with other HR leaders throughout history? Well, naturally Babe Ruth, especially early in his career, had even bigger HR gaps:

• 35 - 1921: Babe Ruth 59 over Bob Meusel and Ken Williams 24

• 35 - 1920: Babe Ruth 54 over George Sisler 19

• 23 - 1928: Babe Ruth 54 over Hack Wilson and Jim Bottomley 31

• 26 - 1926: Babe Ruth 47 over Hack Wilson 21

• 19 - 1924: Babe Ruth 46 over Jack Fournier and Joe Hauser 27

• 17 - 1919: Babe Ruth 29 over Gavvy Cravath 12

Ruth's epic 1927 season, when he hit 61 HR, was only 14 ahead of his teammate Lou Gehrig's 47 HR total.

What about others besides Ruth? Only once, since 1901, has the leader had a bigger HR gap than Judge's 16 in 2022... and interestingly, Ruth was the guy who was the runner-up:

• 17 - 1932: Jimmie Foxx 58 over Babe Ruth 41

When researching this, here are the other seasons with HR gaps of 10 or more:

• 14 - 1933: Jimmie Foxx 48 over Babe Ruth 34

• 13 - 1965: Willie Mays 52 over Willie McCovey 39

• 12 - 2010: Jose Bautista 54 over Pujols 42

• 11 - 1990: Cecil Fielder 51 over Ryne Sandberg 40

• 11 - 1989: Kevin Mitchell 47 over Howard Johnson and Fred McGriff 36

• 11 - 1977: George Foster 52 over Jeff Burroughs 41

• 11 - 1949: Ralph Kiner 54 over Ted Williams 43

• 10 - 1950: Ralph Kiner 47 over Al Rosen 37

• 10 - 1995: Albert Belle 50 over Frank Thomas, Dante Bichette, Jay Buhner 40 each

To me, the big HR gap was a key reason that so many voted for Judge as AL MVP over Ohtani, and again I think rightly so. If 2022 had been more of an inflated HR year, with say Judge's 62 leading several guys hitting 50+, and a half-dozen more hitting 40+, then Judge's feat would have been less impressive. The AL MVP vote at that point might have been a real nail-biter.