New York Yankees' Aaron Judge reacts during the first inning of the team's baseball game against the Tampa Bay Rays on Saturday, Sept. 10, 2022, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger) (Adam Hunger, AP)
Aaron Judge was named TIME’s Athlete of the Year on Tuesday morning – and in his interview with the magazine, revealed a long-ago prediction he made about his baseball future.
When Judge was a high school senior in 2010 at Linden High School, his hometown located about 80 miles east of Oracle Park, Judge told his then-girlfriend Sam that, in 10 years, he’d be married to her and playing for the San Francisco Giants.
“I was like, that’d better not get out,” Judge quipped to TIME’s Sean Gregory.
Judge didn’t hit the 10-year mark exactly on either part of the prediction, but he made the first part true a year ago, marrying Sam on Dec. 11, 2021.
Now, a year later, he can make the second part come true, too.
The reigning AL MVP spent Monday night in Tampa Bay, where the Yankees’ spring training facility is located, and went to the Buccaneers-Saints game. He also said hello to another Northern California product, Bucs quarterback Tom Brady, who quipped that the 6-foot-7 right fielder should play tight end for him.
It isn’t known if Judge met with the Yankees while the star was in Tampa, but his feelings about the way recently extended Yankees general manager Brian Cashman handled the extension negotiations are now known.
As the Yankees started the 2022 season, Cashman disclosed to the media that Judge had turned down a seven-year, $213.5 million contract offer. While Judge refrained from commenting much about it during the season, he told TIME the revelation irked him.
“We kind of said, hey, let’s keep this between us,” Judge said. “I was a little upset that the numbers came out. I understand it’s a negotiation tactic. Put pressure on me. Turn the fans against me, turn the media on me. That part of it I didn’t like.”
He got them all back on his side by smashing 62 home runs, the most an American League player has ever hit in one season, and nearly winning the Triple Crown. It’s made him the top target throughout free agency and the focal point of the winter meetings in San Diego.
Judge is reportedly heading to San Diego on Tuesday and many around the industry expect him to sign this week. While some in the game consider his 62 homers the “true single-season record,” Judge himself does not, saying the record belongs to Barry Bonds, one of his favorite players growing up.
Now, exactly 30 years to the day Bonds signed with his hometown team at the Winter Meetings, Judge has a chance to do the exact same thing.
And make his high school self rather prescient, too.
Originally published at Alex Simon