Mason Katz was at the airport in Boston, waiting to fly to Omaha for the 2012 College Home Run Derby, when he noticed another baseball player from the Cape Cod League sitting near the gate.

So he walked over to introduce himself to Aaron Judge.

“He stood up to shake my hand, and I remember looking straight up,” said Katz, who is 5 feet 9 inches tall. When they boarded the plane, Judge was so busy chatting with Katz that he hit his head on the doorway entering the plane. “I couldn’t do that if I jumped,” Katz said.

Judge, who stands 6-7 and weighs 282 pounds, has remained an outsize figure in his rookie season with the Yankees, hitting a major-league-leading 30 home runs, many of them prodigious blasts. He has almost instantly become one of the most captivating players in baseball.

Judge, who will start in right field for the American League in Tuesday night’s All-Star Game after being the league’s leading vote-getter, will first take center stage on Monday in the All-Star Home Run Derby. He will be trying to unseat the defending champion, Giancarlo Stanton, who is 6-6, 245 pounds, and will be on his home turf in Miami.