Aaron Judge, once again, was undeniable.
For the third time in the past four years, the Yankee captain is the American League MVP. Judge edged out Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh by securing 17 of 30 first-place votes. It was the closest balloting for an MVP award since 2019, when Mike Trout defeated Alex Bregman by the same total voting margin of 355-335. This year’s tight race was a product of Raleigh’s historic season for a backstop and yet another dominant offensive campaign from Judge.
In many MLB seasons, Raleigh would have been a runaway winner. The switch-hitting Mariner clocked 60 home runs, 13 more than the previous record for a catcher. He simultaneously helmed a Seattle pitching staff that waded through a fair share of injuries, guiding the club to its first AL West title in over two decades. Raleigh even found time to win the Home Run Derby. By all measures, it was a special year.
But Judge, in the end, was too much for even Raleigh to overcome.
The 33-year-old outfielder is now the third player in MLB history to win three MVP awards in a four-year span, joining Barry Bonds and 2025 NL MVP Shohei Ohtani.
Judge’s season didn’t feature any sexy round numbers, home run chases or significant career milestones. Sure he flirted with a .400 average into June and captured his first career batting title with a .331 mark. But Judge’s 2025 season — ever so slightly worse than his 2024 season — was brilliant for, above all else, its consistency.
On Opening Day against the Milwaukee Brewers, Judge went 1-for-4 with a double, giving him a .250 average and .750 OPS . The next day, against a Brewers pitching staff so depleted that it unleashed the frenzied Torpedo Bat craze, Judge went 4-for-6 with three homers. From that point forward, his batting average never dropped below .300 and his OPS never dropped below 1.000. At no point did he slump as Judge never went three consecutive games without a hit.
Judge finished the year with a preposterous 1.144 OPS, a figure that led the American League by a whopping 185 points over Blue Jays DH George Springer in second place. Besides Raleigh’s tally of 60 home runs, Judge paced the American League in every significant rate-based statistical category. He was not just the best; he was the best by an overwhelming margin.
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The OPS gap between Judge and Springer in second place was the same between Springer and Jarren Duran’s .774 OPS all the way down in 33rd in the AL. And for good measure, Judge improved significantly as an outfielder in 2025, according to most advanced defensive metrics. He is running a different race, playing a different game, obliterating the competition at every turn.
And that’s why, despite Raleigh’s unforgettably singular season, Judge is taking home the hardware for the third time in his career.
This third MVP all but secures Judge a place in Cooperstown. All the other three-time winners are either in the Hall of Fame (Yogi Berra, Roy Campanella, Joe DiMaggio, Jimmie Foxx, Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, Mike Schmidt), not yet eligible (Shohei Ohtani, Albert Pujols, Mike Trout) or would be first-ballot shoo-ins if not for alleged PED use (Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez).
There is a strong case to be made that Judge is the single greatest right-handed hitter in the sport’s history, or, at the very least, after integration. His 179 OPS+ is the highest career mark for a righty since integration. Only 10 other hitters (Trout, Mark McGwire, Dick Allen, Frank Thomas, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Manny Ramírez, Frank Robinson, Ralph Kiner and DiMaggio) are even above 150.
Put differently, Judge is the type of hitter so unavoidably good that he supersedes seasons like the one Raleigh just put up. It’s yet another data point on Judge’s résumé as one of the best sluggers to ever play the game. There remains a gaping void in his trophy case; that ever-elusive first World Series title. But as this October showed us, one locked-in dynamo cannot carry a franchise alone. Judge dominated this postseason and it made little difference.
Whether or not his autumn moment ever comes is to be determined. It is, for the most part, beyond Judge’s control. He seems to have come to accept that humbling reality. And instead of stressing about his legacy and the understandably high standards of YankeeLand, Judge has directed that focus and intensity into his craft.
The results are self-evident.
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