Aaron Judge gifts Anthony Volpe a PS5, beats him in FIFA 23

It’s been a season of firsts for New York Yankees rookie shortstop Anthony Volpe.

He played in his first major league spring training. He made his first Opening Day lineup at 21 — the youngest Yankee to start in an opener since Derek Jeter. He got his first MLB hits, a pair of singles in his second big league game.

Next up: Finally getting the best of Aaron Judge at FIFA 23.

A budding interest in soccer amplified after Volpe watched the World Cup which was played in November and December to avoid the summer temperatures in the host nation of Qatar. When his family took a trip to Italy to see relatives, Volpe was suddenly a bona fide fan of the beautiful game.

“Went to Italy over the offseason, to Florence — hanging around with my cousins, all Napoli fans, and that combo with the past World Cup, it got me into soccer,” Volpe told ESPN.

A natural next step for Volpe was picking up the massively popular video game FIFA 23. He started playing on his PlayStation 4 most nights during spring training, with one of his roommates, Mickey Gasper, becoming his main challenger.

What Volpe didn’t know is that there were others in the clubhouse paying attention.

Judge, who has developed quite a reputation for his FIFA skills since he started playing regularly in 2021, overheard Volpe talking about his new habit. But Judge plays FIFA 23 on the next-gen console PS5, and with compatibility being an issue for cross-platform play, he decided to gift Volpe a brand-new console so they could face each other.

“It was my way of trying to connect with him and trying to know him as a person, particularly when it comes to the things that he enjoys off the field,” Judge told ESPN. “And one thing that I picked up in spring training was hearing him talk about FIFA.”

When the team arrived in…