CHICAGO — New York Yankees slugger Aaron Judge hit his 300th homer, reaching that milestone faster than any other player when he connected against the Chicago White Sox on Wednesday night.
Judge hit that mark in his 955th game and 3,431st at-bat with a three-run drive in the eighth inning of New York’s 10-2 win. The six-time All-Star and 2022 American League MVP drove a 3-0 up-and-in sinker Chad Kuhl into the White Sox bullpen in left for his major-league-leading 43rd homer.
Ralph Kiner reached 300 homers in his 1,087th game, and Babe Ruth did in his 3,831st at-bat.
Chicago had intentionally walked Juan Soto to bring up Judge, marking just the second time in Judge’s career that the batter before him was intentionally walked. The other time was during Judge’s rookie year, on Aug. 31, 2016 (Chase Headley was intentionally walked at Kansas City in the 13th inning).
It was also just Judge’s third career home run on a 3-0 pitch, and first since 2021.
Judge is the seventh different player to hit 300 home runs for the Yankees in franchise history, joining Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Yogi Berra and Alex Rodriguez.
It took Judge 671 games to reach 200 career home runs; he needed just 284 games to go from 200 to 300.
Judge became the 162nd player all-time to reach 300 homers. His total ranks 13th among active players.
ESPN Stats & Information, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.