Juan Soto's stellar start for the New York Yankees has helped to overshadow the early-season struggles for Aaron Judge, though the 2022 American League MVP is optimistic things will turn around.

Speaking to ESPN's Jorge Castillo, Judge pointed out he's had "seasons where I start off worse than this in my career" and things improved.

"I'm still Aaron Judge," he said. "I don't think that's changed."

Judge is hitting .178/.317/.356 with four homers and 13 RBI in 123 plate appearances. While that looks bad, some of the underlying metrics show he's been the victim of bad luck more than anything else.

Per Baseball Savant, Judge ranks in the 82nd percentile in barrel rate (82 percent), 91st percentile in hard-hit rate (52.2), 96th percentile in average exit velocity (94.0) and 96th percentile in walk rate (16.3).

For comparison, Judge was in the 100th percentile in all of those categories last season. Even though he hasn't been quite as effective so far this season, the drop isn't so appreciable in any category that it should be a concern.

One area in which Judge's swing is different now from past years, which MLB Network's Sean Casey and Harold Reynolds discussed this week, is where his hands start.

This a fairly simple mechanical adjustment that Judge can make to turn things around.

One encouraging sign for the Yankees is they are off to a 17-10 start despite getting subpar production from Judge and not having Gerrit Cole yet due to an elbow injury.

Soto has been everything the Bronx Bombers could have hoped for when they acquired him in the offseason. He's hitting .324/.437/.588 with seven homers and 23 RBI. Anthony Volpe is breaking out with a .284/.354/.402 slash line in 26 games.

When Judge gets back on track, the Yankees will be arguably the most dangerous team in the AL.