NEW YORK — Aaron Judge was flabbergasted. He did not understand why this was a topic of conversation.

But in addition to the New York Yankees hitting a franchise-record nine home runs in Saturday’s historic offensive performance, there was considerable attention on the “torpedo” bats some players used to hit those dingers.

With those pieces of lumber, the barrel’s sweet spot is closer to a player’s hands rather than toward the end of the bat. When perfectly crafted, the bat’s weight distribution should feel evenly spread out. Judge, who hit three home runs in the Yankees’ 20-9 win Saturday, doesn’t use the bats and said he has zero interest in switching.

“What I did the past couple of seasons speaks for itself,” Judge said Sunday morning. “Why try to change something if you have something that’s working?”

Judge isn’t the only Yankee who plans to stick with his prior equipment. Rookie left fielder Jasson Domínguez doesn’t plan on switching his bat model, saying it’s too new for him to change.

Anthony Volpe is one of the Yankees who has bought into the torpedo bats. Volpe said he switched last season mainly because some of his older teammates were using them. He’s on his second model of the torpedo bat; he called the first version “horrible” because the weight distribution was far off. Volpe said the first model was a much lighter bat than he wanted to swing.

But one element that sold Volpe on the torpedo bat was how some of his teammates raised the possibility of staying alive in counts.

“We were just talking and saying that if it could help you foul off one pitch this season and buys you one more pitch, and if it helps you one way, I might as well try it,” Volpe said.

Volpe has struggled offensively in his first two seasons in the big leagues, finishing both years with an OPS under .700. The Yankees shortstop was one of the club’s better hitters in the postseason and carried the adjustments he made into spring training.

Former Yankees analyst Aaron Leanhardt, who introduced the torpedo bats to the club, said a hitter’s bat speed could potentially increase depending on how the bat is redesigned; Volpe’s bat speed increased in October and was higher in spring training than it was last season.

But Volpe is unsure how much the bats themselves are making a difference for him at the plate, rather than some of the mechanical adjustments he made going into last October.

“It’s probably just a placebo,” Volpe said. “A lot of it is just looking out at your bat, and you see how big the barrel is. It’s exciting. I think any 0.001 percent mentally that could give you confidence helps.”

Yankees manager Aaron Boone compared the use of the torpedo bats to a golfer going to a simulator to get properly fitted for clubs. The Yankees are trying to optimize their players in all areas. They introduced the momentum leads while on the basepaths two years ago. The club has an extensive pitching lab at their spring training complex that they call the “gas station,” where pitchers can get instantaneous feedback on everything from induced vertical break to spin rates. It’s helped them create new pitches for starters, like Carlos Rodón and his changeup and sinker.

The club is not recommending its players switch to the torpedo bats, but the technology is available to them.

“We’re trying to win on the margins,” Boone said. “There are just more people pouring into trying to optimize guys as best we can.”

The torpedo bats aren’t exclusive to the Yankees. Center fielder Cody Bellinger said the Chicago Cubs used them last year during batting practice. They held off on using them in the games because they were unsure if their success rates would be different when the at-bats mattered. Bellinger is now using a torpedo bat after experimenting with four or five different models during spring.

He’s unsure if this will spread leaguewide because baseball players are “very into what we like.” Bellinger has also noticed a big difference between the torpedo bats and his previous standard bats.

“If it’s not on the sweet spot, you could tell the difference,” Bellinger said.

(Photo of Aaron Judge homering against the Brewers: New York Yankees / Getty Images)