Judge out of lineup again with sore toe; Yankees awaiting test results

NEW YORK (AP) — Aaron Judge’s spectacular catch in Dodger Stadium resulted in a bruised right toe, and the Yankees held their slugger out of the lineup for Tuesday’s game against the Chicago White Sox.

The Yankees did not announce results of testing for Judge, who was scheduled to meet with team physician Dr. Chris Ahmad later Tuesday.

“He’s getting treatment and yeah, the swelling’s better today and he feels a little bit better today,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “So we’ll get with Dr. Ahmad tonight and we’ll kind of see what we have and see where we are tonight or tomorrow.”

Judge banged his right toe while making a running catch in right field during the eighth inning of Saturday’s 6-3 win over the Dodgers. He sat out Sunday's 4-1 victory.

Judge knocked open the door of the visiting bullpen while making the catch on J.D. Martinez’s liner into the right field corner with Max Muncy on first base and nobody out.

Judge is hoping to avoid going on the injured list for the second time this year and eighth time since making his debut on Aug. 13, 2016. The 31-year-old missed 10 games with a strained right hip after getting injured on a headfirst slide attempting to steal third at Minnesota on April 26.

The Yankees went 4-6 during Judge’s absence. Since returning from the hip injury, Judge is batting .326 and has 13 of his AL-best 19 homers.

“I don’t like when he’s not in the lineup and it’s hurting him enough for him not to be in there, but hopefully we get good news and he continues to progress,” Boone said. “It seems like he’s progressed here over the last 24 hours from a swelling standpoint, which I think is an important factor of it all is getting that swelling out of there and kind of having a better idea of what you have. So we’ll see.”

Judge did not go on the IL in either of the previous two seasons. He appeared in 155 games in 2022 when he hit 62 homers to break Roger Maris’ AL record and played 148 games a year earlier.

The Yankees also said Tuesday they will place Nestor Cortes on the injured list with a shoulder issue. Cortes is expected to miss at least two starts. Randy Vásquez will start Wednesday.

Cortes is 5-2 with a 5.16 ERA in 11 starts and has particularly struggled later in outings. Opponents are hitting .447 when facing him for the third time in a game.

Last year, Cortes was an All-Star and went 12-4 with a 2.44 ERA in 28 starts.

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