Anthony Volpe connection to Aaron Judge slump has Yankees fans asking tough questions

Through the Fourth of July, New York Yankees captain Aaron Judge was the runaway favorite for the AL MVP award. Since July 5, a prolonged slump from Judge has made his quest for a second consecutive MVP honor a much more hotly contested debate.

Though he's woken up a bit over the last few days, he'll need to find a semblance of consistency to show fans he's snapped out of the funk.

So what happened on July 5? Well, everyone's favorite punching bag, Anthony Volpe, just happened to hit Judge in the head with a wildly errant warm-up toss. Since that comically bad gaffe, the drop off in Judge's performance has been stark.

The sharp declines in Judge's batting average, on-base percentage, and, more than anything, slugging percentage are jarring. But is Volpe really to blame for the captain's slump?

Did Anthony Volpe's errant throw actually cause Aaron Judge's slump amid the Yankees' slide?

While it's a funny line of demarcation, Judge's tail-spin didn't exactly start on July 5. In fact, the most likely inflection point for when things started going downhill for the seven-time All-Star is when he hurt his elbow against the Toronto Blue Jays on July 22.

Though Judge came off the IL on August 5, it's still highly likely that the elbow is still bothering him to some extent. While most of the concern surrounds when he can get back out to right field and save the hot-hitting, yet incredibly immobile Giancarlo Stanton, from having to lumber around on defense for much longer, the bigger concern should be on his offensive performance.

The Yankees need to start proving that they can beat good teams, rather than simply beat up on bad ones, and Judge isn't wrong when he says that the responsibility for the team's performance falls squarely on the players' shoulders.

After last year's disappearing act in the playoffs, that goes double for Judge, who is the engine that makes the Yankees run. Barring injury, it's likely he turns it around soon. He might not get back to the blistering, near-.400 average pace he was at to start the year, but we all know that Judge can hit.

What he'll need to do is prove that he can hit when it counts. That is the most pressing question that must be answered. The sooner the better.

And by the way, you can certainly blame Volpe for a good deal of things. In fact, that's sort of become a favorite pastime for most Yankee fans, and for good reason. But this time, the blame lies elsewhere, and it's on Judge to get it figured out.