Sidelined

Chances are that Mike Trout wasn't smiling when he learned he'd need surgery on his injured thumb. Baseball's best player -- enjoying a stellar first two months of 2017 with the Angels -- will undergo surgery for a torn thumb ligament. That will sideline him up to eight weeks, a crushing blow to an Angels team far behind the Astros in the AL West. But it's a huge blow to all of baseball, to have Trout, going neck and neck with Aaron Judge of the Yankees in the early-season MVP speculation, on the shelf.

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