ESPN’s Aaron Judge graphic for 62nd home run is laughably bad

If you know only one thing about Yankees star Aaron Judge’s chase to pass Roger Maris with his 62nd home run, you know that it kind of took a while.

Between Judge bashing his 60th homer against the Pirates in the Bronx and Judge eventually setting a new historic mark, two weeks went by. And then, of course, there was the month before that, when Judge was putting 50 and 55 in the rear view faster than anyone anticipated, setting himself up to have a real shot at denting the top of the leaderboard before the end of the season.

Still … given all that runway and prep time … ESPN’s Twitter account pasted the number “62” on a photo of Judge, slapped a couple of dead Yankees on there with uneven borders (lasso tool?) and called it a day.

Let’s take a moment to pause before the big reveal. You know what you clicked on. You know why you’re here. You want to gawk at the “laughably bad” graphic the same way you wanted to see “Don’t Worry Darling.” You want to take a peek, but not a long stare, like you’re driving by three buzzards eating a prairie dog. You’re also worried it’s not that bad, like when you pull off to the side of the road to take a look at Nebraska’s Biggest Squash and you’ve seen bigger.

Rest assured. This is not that.

ESPN’s Aaron Judge graphic for Yankees record home run is horrendous

Let’s pick it apart, piece by piece:

• Judge is standing at second base and waving his teammates to come and get him, a photo I believe is from the 2021 AL Wild Card spot-clinching walk-off of the Rays. You can immediately do better.
• The ad board behind Judge says “Aaron Judge.” If that’s real, I don’t recall. If not, what an unnecessary touch.
• The chromium “62” is not a color that’s representative of the Yankees in any way, unless it’s an ironic reference to how rooting for them in the ’50s felt like rooting for US Steel.
• Look at Maris and Ruth. Just … look at them. Ruth is looking at you, too. Maris is looking at the sky, almost as if he is imagining better graphics.
• Maris and Ruth are both so very tiny.

So kudos to the Red Sox fan who cooked this one up and spent their hard-earned couple of seconds on putting it together. The creative team of Big Papi, Peter Gammons, Rays manager Kevin Cash, Frankie Lasagna, and The 7 Line Army really crafted a heartfelt tribute to Yankees history here, and we simply have to tip our caps.

At the end of the day, we can all agree on one thing: if Judge is going to be posed like that, he should at least be cradling Lil’ Ruth and Lil’ Maris sideways in his big arms. At the very least.

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