JUDGE WIELDS GAVEL
Yanks’ star wins; Marlins’ Stanton falls in 1st round
MIAMI — The dream matchup wasn’t to be. Still, the Home Run Derby delivered a resounding hit on a night full of long balls and close battles by some of baseball’s best sluggers.
The drama started early Monday at Marlins Park when Miami outfielder and defending champion Giancarlo Stanton took too long to find his groove and exited in the first round, falling one homer short of young Yankees catcher Gary Sanchez.
That opened the door for fellow young Yankees slugger Aaron Judge to become the new king of the long ball, thrilling a crowd of 37,027. Judge, who is from Southern California like Stanton and is even bigger, sent balls to parts of the park the Marlins’ four-time AllStar hasn’t reached. Judge drove back-to-back shots of 504 and 513 feet in the semifinals.
With thunder booming outside the ballpark and lightning flashing beyond the windows, Judge put away Minnesota’s Miguel Sanó in the final 11-10, stopping with two of his allotted four minutes left.
The 6-foot-7 Judge had to fend off a high-level challenge by the other Marlins slugger in the field, Justin Bour, in a first-round thriller to avoid the same fate as Stanton.
That would be the toughest test of the night for Judge, who is having a dream season, leading the majors with 30 home runs at the break.
Judge dispatched Dodgers
Rookie of the Year candidate Cody Bellinger in the semifinals, stopping with a minute remaining after pulling ahead 14-13.
After the Twins third baseman managed only 10 homers to open the final round, all that remained was a coronation for Judge.
He barely broke a sweat in completing the ascension.
“I had a lot of fun. I hope the fans enjoyed the show; it was an awesome atmosphere,” Judge said. “Everyone put on a show here.”
Only Bour was able to stretch him to the limit. Bour pounded 22 homers, the fourth-highest total in one round in derby history at that point. A few minutes later Judge bettered it. Judge needed every second of his four-minute session and a 30-second bonus round to push his total to 23. Hitters
received the bonus for two or more homers of 440 feet or longer.
“Bour put on a show for these fans. They enjoyed it,” Judge said. “I was just trying to do the same thing.”
Judge hit one 501 feet that sailed over the home-run sculpture in left-center in the opening round. Another that may have been destined to go even farther hit the roof and didn’t even count. Stanton, who hit a record 61 homers over three rounds in winning at San Diego, had already been relegated to valet for teammate Bour, bringing him an energy-boosting doughnut during a timeout.
Prior to the derby, Stanton shrugged off the Marlins’ late return from their weekend series in San Francisco, arriving in South Florida at about 5 a.m. Monday. He appeared weary during the media-day session.
“A couple of hours of sleep,” he said. “Doesn’t matter. We all got to call timeout
there. Doesn’t matter. We’re all going to show up.”
Sanchez threw down the gauntlet for Stanton with 17 long balls, many of them very long. The Yankees catcher hit only 13 homers in the first half of the season, due to missing nearly a month to a biceps injury. That led to the Tampa Bay Rays’ Logan Morrison questioning his inclusion in the derby.
But Sanchez’s power is legitimate. His average homer length this season of 427 feet leads the majors among players with 10 or more, and his average exit velocity of 93.5 mph also tops Stanton. Sanchez smacked nine balls longer than 440 feet. He hit three off the exterior windows, with a long of 483 feet. Stanton hit five balls longer than 485 feet, topping out with a 496-footer off the back window. He had the top exit velocity at 121 mph to Sanchez’s 116, but he hit a lot of high drives that fell in the outer reaches of the outfield.