Judge immediately followed<\/a> by driving a full-count curveball 414 feet to tie for the MLB lead with his 11th.<\/p>\n\u201cAfter he hit his, he said, `I’m not going to let Benny catch me,’\u201d Rice said with a smile. \u201cJust trying to keep him honest, keep him motivated.\u201d<\/p>\n
They became the second pair of Yankees teammates to each have 10 or more homers in the first 29 games of a season, joining Mantle and Berra in 1956.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m glad that I don\u2019t have to face them, let\u2019s just put it that way,\u201d said Yankees starter Max Fried (4-1), who threw six scoreless innings for New York (19-10).<\/p>\n
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\u201cBenny\u2019s off to an amazing start. Judgie, ho-hum, 11 homers already,\u201d manager Aaron Boone said. \u201cIt’s a pretty good combo there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rice, a 27-year-old first baseman, is hitting .322 with 23 RBIs. Judge is at .252 with 19 RBIs.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust consistent at-bat after consistent at-bat. Like it\u2019s must-watch TV at this point,\u201d Judge said of Rice. \u201cHe’s going to put something in play hard or he\u2019s going to take his walk and pass the baton. It’s just impressive to watch, and I get a front-row seat. … And, makes my job easier when he does that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rice deposited a 95 mph first-pitch fastball from Jack Leiter into the Yankees bullpen in left-center field to make it 2-0 with two outs in the third inning. It was Rice’s sixth homer in 11 games.<\/p>\n
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Judge then homered into the left-field seats, the ball landing not far from the spot he hit his AL season record 62nd homer on Oct. 4, 2022. He also had two doubles and was hit by a pitch in his other plate appearances.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe his best game of at-bats. … On all four times, stings two doubles, smokes the homer where he just rides out the curveball,\u201d Boone said.<\/p>\n
And it came a day after Judge also went deep on his 34th birthday.<\/p>\n
Judge has hit 260 of his 379 career homers since the start of the 2021 season and already has four 50-homer seasons.<\/p>\n
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Rice has 43 homers in 216 career games since his debut in June 2024.<\/p>\n
After their fast starts in 1956, Mantle went on to hit a majors-best 52 homers and Berra finished with 30.<\/p>\n
When Rice was asked if he could keep pace with Judge all season, he said he’s relishing the moment now.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, I don\u2019t know how long this is going to last, but I\u2019m enjoying it. I\u2019m enjoying it right now being this close,\u201d Rice said before reflecting on the history he now shares with a trio of three-time MVPs: Judge and two Hall of Fame players.<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s pretty cool. I definitely would not have anticipated something like that,\u201d he said. \u201cBut obviously the three names I\u2019m surrounded with there are pretty big ones, so definitely very humbling.\u201d<\/p>\n
AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/a>\n<\/p>\nArticle continues below this ad<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge and Ben Rice, right, celebrate Rice’s two-run home run in the third inning…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":269327,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[83620,99612,150,152,151,99618,53310,99783,57917,23681,202,196,85772,42094,198,199,942,100311],"class_list":{"0":"post-269674","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arlington","8":"tag-aaron-boone","9":"tag-aaron-judge","10":"tag-arlington","11":"tag-arlington-headlines","12":"tag-arlington-news","13":"tag-ben-rice","14":"tag-jack-leiter","15":"tag-max-fried","16":"tag-mickey-mantle","17":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","18":"tag-package-100502-member-choice-sports-option","19":"tag-product-30599-ap-sports-news-s-wire-only","20":"tag-product-31999-ap-online-baseball-news","21":"tag-product-32562-ap-online-other-sports-news","22":"tag-product-40802-ap-new-york-city-sports-only","23":"tag-product-40803-ap-new-york-state-sports-only","24":"tag-product-40815-ap-texas-sports-only","25":"tag-yankees-judge-rice-homers-mantle-berra-mlb"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}