The Bronx Bummer

Aaron Judge has been diagnosed with a stress fracture in a rib on his right side, just days after the Yankees said it was a day-to-day injury. The team now says Judge will miss "significant time" and that the best-case scenario is a return sometime in August. It is June 5th. Ben Maller, host of the overnight Fox Sports Radio show, has seen this movie before — many times.

The Yankees' Annual Subscription to Injury Denial

Maller's central argument is that the Yankees have a well-established pattern of downplaying Aaron Judge injuries, only to admit weeks later that the situation is serious. He compares the organization's approach to how Apple handles battery issues: "They deny it, they downplay it, and then quietly admit the truth weeks and weeks later." Manager Aaron Boone, in Maller's telling, has become "the skipper who cried wolf."

The evidence is a long medical history. Maller rattles off Judge's injuries over the years: multiple oblique strains, a torn left shoulder, broken wrist, right shoulder issue, calf strain, left side injury, back spasms, right hip, big toe, left hand, right elbow flexor, and now the rib stress fracture. "If injuries were birthdays, Aaron Judge would need a cake the size of Manhattan," Maller says. "This isn't a setback. This is an annual subscription."