Yankees star Aaron Judge on pace to shatter MLB record held by Babe Ruth

What does one do for an encore after having a season for the ages?

Aaron Judge seemed to reach the pinnacle of baseball in 2024, leading the majors in virtually every offensive category en route to winning his second American League Most Valuable Player Award.

Having just turned 33 years old last week, it seemed hard to imagine that there was still room for Judge to grow, but the captain of the New York Yankees continues to one-up himself. 

Not only is Judge off to a better start than last year’s AL MVP campaign, but through the first 30 games of the 2025 season, Judge is on pace to have the greatest season in Major League Baseball history.

One of the best ways to measure the impact one individual has on his team’s success is through Wins Above Replacement (WAR), a statistic that encompasses every aspect of a player’s game (hitting, fielding, and base running). 

The record for highest WAR in a single season belongs to none other than Babe Ruth. The Bambino had a 14.1 WAR during the 1923 season, and no one has come close to breaking that record over 100 years later.

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While it’s still early in the 2025 season, Judge is well-positioned to pass The Sultan of Swat’s single-season mark by a substantial margin. 

Putting together a WAR of 2.7 for an entire season would be a great success for most major league players, but Judge has accomplished that feat in just 30 games. This puts the two-time AL MVP on pace for a WAR of 14.6 through a full 162-game season, 0.5 points higher than Ruth’s record.

Part of the reason why Judge is on such a historic trajectory is his jaw-dropping batting average. Judge leads the majors by a wide margin with a .412 average, and people are already starting to wonder if he’ll be the first player since Ted Williams in 1941 to bat over .400 for a full season.

While it seems impossible for a player in today’s game to do what Williams did 84 years ago, Yankees manager Aaron Boone doesn’t think it’s smart to doubt the captain. 

“As I always say with him, I’m not gonna put anything past him,” Boone said per NJ Advance Media.

Even if Judge falls short of batting .400 or breaking Ruth’s single-season WAR record, the superstar slugger has established himself as the favorite to win his third AL MVP award before the calendar even flips to May.

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