ST. PETERSBURG -- Dressed in workout gear, Aaron Judge turned a corner at Tropicana Field on Friday afternoon, acknowledging his arriving Yankees teammates. The captain’s workday was already hours deep, and the slogan imprinted across his T-shirt said plenty: “No time like October.”
Judge has made his position clear -- he wants to be part of everything that transpires this month. Now the Yankees need to make their call.
With Game 1 of the American League Division Series scheduled to begin on Saturday, the Yankees plan to decide late Friday whether Judge’s strained right calf has healed enough to warrant his inclusion on the 26-man roster for their showdown against the Rays.
“We’re looking at the days, and so, it’s more, ‘Is he going to be available at some point in this series potentially as a player?’” manager Aaron Boone said. “That’s what we’re kind of weighing and then seeing where he’s at now these last few days, having taken live BP. We’ll see how [Friday] goes.”
Judge was not active for the AL Wild Card Series against the Red Sox, still recovering from a moderate strain of the soleus muscle in his right calf that he sustained on Sept. 16. Typically, that sort of injury requires at least three weeks for a full recovery.
The three-time AL MVP is doing everything that he can to beat that timeline.
“Saturday is a long ways away,” Judge said after the Game 2 victory over Boston. “I’m doing everything I can -- all morning, night, during the game, everything -- to prepare myself to be ready to go. Yeah, I want to be in there. But we’ll see what happens.”
Having received a platelet-poor plasma (PPP) injection in late September, Judge had four plate appearances in live BP at Yankee Stadium on Monday, then traveled to the home of the Double-A Somerset Patriots to take additional at-bats on Wednesday.
He did more hitting on Thursday in New York, then participated in an early workout on Friday at George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, Fla.
“We had some guys go over there early and do some things,” Boone said. “But we’ll have the big workout here [at Tropicana Field].”
The Yankees have been cautious with Judge’s running progression, fearful of aggravating the strain. After several days on an anti-gravity treadmill, he progressed to running in right field before Game 1 of the AL Wild Card Series.
Boone said before Friday’s workout that Judge has not yet run the bases, but the manager suggested he may not need to before being activated.
“Sometimes running the bases, they replicate things in other ways,” Boone said. “The trainers will obviously play a big part in this. As the day unfolds, we’ll see where we’re at and what it potentially looks like for the series.”
Judge, 34, missed 84 games earlier this season with a fractured right rib before returning on Sept. 8. He played seven games before straining his calf on Sept. 16 at Target Field against the Twins.
Overall, he batted .241/.360/.511 with 18 home runs and an .871 OPS in 66 regular-season games.
Giancarlo Stanton, who missed most of the season due to several calf injuries but was active for the Wild Card Series, said the biggest challenge in returning to action after a lengthy layoff is adjusting to velocity.
“You see as much velocity as you can,” Stanton said. “Just try to visualize stuff out there and be ready for the moment.”
The Yankees carried 10 pitchers and 16 position players for the Wild Card round, something they’re unlikely to do again in a best-of-five series against the Rays. Boone said Judge’s injury could impact how willing the Yankees are to have him play the field, especially on Tropicana Field’s artificial turf.
With several other DH options already on board, including Ben Rice and Paul Goldschmidt, Judge’s return would complicate that rotation. Stanton was on the Wild Card roster as a pinch-hitter; it’s unlikely the Yankees would carry both Judge and Stanton in their current situations.
“We haven’t decided that yet,” Boone said. “We haven’t sat down and talked in the room, like, ‘This is what we’re doing.’ Everyone is weighing in right now. Everyone is in play.”