When hurtin' ain't certain

 Once upon the Before Time, when men were men and injuries were 'tis but a scratch, a Los Angeles Ram named Jack Youngblood played the Super Bowl on a broken leg.

Years later, Tiger Woods won a major on a broken leg and an injured knee. Dale Earnhardt once finished sixth at Watkins Glen two weeks after breaking his collarbone and dislocating his sternum in a crash at Talladega. And by the time Bobby Orr was done playing hockey, he was playing on knees that had no cartilage in them.

I bring all this up because Aaron Judge sat out a game for the New York Yankees the other day.

The official reason, according to Yankees manager Aaron Boone: "General soreness in his left side."

Now, I don't know what Boone meant by "general soreness." Maybe it was a persistent ache, like when you sleep wrong or something. Maybe it was really, really bad general soreness, like when you're running and you get a stitch in your side and you suddenly find yourself in the hellscape of a Soreness Apocalypse.

Shoot. Maybe the Yankees were afraid the general soreness would become a localized soreness, and that would escalate into a strained whatchamathing. And then Judge would aggravate  the strained whatchamathing, and it would become a pulled whatchamathing.

After which he would go on the DL, and no one would see him until June.

So I can understand why the Yankees would rather be safe than sorry, and sit him out. I mean, when one of the biggest bats in your lineup has an owie, you don't mess around. Because what if it turns out to be a Super Owie, and spraying Bactine on it doesn't work anymore?

Then you might have to call Neosporin off the bench and that wouldn't be good.

So, Aaron Judge sat out the other night.

Meanwhile, a week ago, an MMA fighter named Khetag Pliev lost his finger during a bout. No, really. He literally lost his finger -- as in, it got torn off and no one could find it for several minutes until it turned up inside Pliev's glove.

Five days later Pliev was training again.

None of this is to suggest baseball players are big wusses compared to other professional athletes. Well, maybe it is. I honestly don't know. 

I have some general soreness in my left whatchamathing, see. It's kinda distracting me, so I think I'll go sit down now.

Scootch over, Aaron.