Judge 1 HR shy of 50; teammate accidentally wears 50?

OAKLAND -- Perhaps No. 50 was slowly but surely worming its way into the Yankees' collective subconscious during Friday night's 3-2 win over the A's at the Oakland Coliseum.

That may have been the case for Lou Trivino, at least. The right-hander was warming up in the bottom of the ninth inning when he was suddenly tapped on the shoulder and informed that he was wearing Jameson Taillon's No. 50 jersey instead of his own No. 56.

"I'm a meme now. It happens," said Trivino, who explained that he must have accidentally grabbed a jersey from Taillon's neighboring locker instead of his own. "Wasn't the first time, probably won't be the last."

But Trivino was not the only Yankees player to feel the magnetic pull of No. 50 on Friday night, as Aaron Judge got one step closer to the magic number with his 49th home run of the season.

? Aaron Judge home run pace tracker

"It's really special to get to have the best seat in the house every night for The Aaron Judge Show," New York right-hander Gerrit Cole said, "which is one-of-a-kind right now."

Judge provided all the Yankees' offense with a three-run homer to deep center field in the fifth. The 30-year-old didn't wait around as he pounced on the first pitch he saw from former teammate JP Sears, a hanging slider that Judge crushed a Statcast-projected 427 feet with an exit velocity of 109 mph.

Judge's 49 home runs are the second most by any AL/NL player prior to September dating back to the 2002 season. He trails only fellow Yankees slugger Giancarlo Stanton, who had 51 at the end of August 2017, when he was with the Marlins. He's currently on pace to hit an AL record 63 homers this season.

Most HR in a season, MLB history -- with totals through 126 team games:

2001 Barry Bonds: 73 -- 54
1998 Mark McGwire: 70 -- 51
1998 Sammy Sosa: 66 -- 48
1999 Mark McGwire: 65 -- 50
2001 Sammy Sosa: 64 -- 49
2022 Aaron Judge: 63 (current pace) -- 49
1999 Sammy Sosa: 63 -- 53
1961 Roger Maris: 61 -- 50
1927 Babe Ruth: 60 -- 42

Judge has been hitting balls out at a frenzied pace all season, but he was recently stuck in a nine-game homerless stretch from Aug. 13-21, his longest drought of the season. With three home runs in his past four games, Judge seems to be heating up again.

And what do these numbers mean to him?

"Nothing. It's just another number," Judge said. "I'm happy to get another win, keep this winning streak going and just provide some runs for the great start that Cole had today. It was pretty impressive to watch."

Judge’s blast provided all the runs the Yankees needed, as it backed a strong start from Cole, who earned his first win since July 17. The right-handed ace put on a masterclass in missing bats as he carved up the A's lineup over 7 1/3 innings, scattering three hits and two walks. His sole blemish came in the seventh, when he gave up a solo home run to Jonah Bride.

"In a way, you want to cheat to get to his fastball. But tonight, he was really going away and tunneling his slider with that," Bride said. "He made it a tough time, for sure.”

Cole generated 16 whiffs from the A's lineup and struck out 11 batters, bringing his season tally to 200, the most in MLB.

Having recorded 243 strikeouts last year, Cole is now the fourth Yankees pitcher to notch two 200-plus-strikeout seasons, joining Luis Severino (2017 and '18), David Cone (1997 and '98) and Ron Guidry (1978 and '79). It's the fifth 200-strikeout season of Cole's career, making him one of eight active pitchers with at least that many.

Cole, too, was rather understated about his personal accomplishment.

"It's a meaningful number, but we're not done yet," Cole said, eventually conceding the feat is "pretty cool."

Neither Judge nor Cole claimed to care much about their own milestone accomplishments, but they were both fascinated by one thing from Friday night: Trivino's jersey caper.

Cole allowed himself a wry chuckle and said he had never seen anything like that before, while Judge said he wasn't aware of the situation until after the game. But he promised to rag Trivino a little to make up for lost time.

"I didn't know about that. I'll definitely get on him," Judge said with a smile. "I'm going to wear him out."