Mike McCann's Field of Fotos

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.

Monday's "hot" baseball story was the brawl that broke out in the Nationals-Giants game after San Francisco reliever Hunter Strickland hit Bruce Harper with a pitch. The Nats star then charged the mound, with punches being thrown and teammates charging the field before the sides were separated. With Monday being a national holiday, the MLB offices were closed. But Tuesday, we can expect a ruling to come down regarding suspensions. The bitterness between Harper and Strickland apparently reaches back to 2014, when Bryce belted a pair of homers off the Giants reliever. They had not faced each other since. Wait a second: does lighting up a pitcher automatically lead to hitting a batter in retaliation -- nearly three years later? I don't think so. A brush back? Perhaps. But so much time elapsed that the incident is probably going to draw an angry reaction from the Commissioner.

While it would have been easy to give the honors to Aaron Judge for the first grand slam of his career -- which brought the Yankees from behind in a game they won 9-5 -- I'd rather focus on someone from another contender. In this case, the Twins catcher-turned-1st baseman Joe Mauer, who got on base seven times (with four hits and three walks) in the Twins 8-6, 15-inning loss to Tampa Bay. Now 34, Mauer isn't nearly the offensive threat he was between 2005 and '13. And he's not playing a "premium" position anymore. But with Minnesota one of this year's unexpected surprises as they lead the AL Central, take a good look. This Twin Cities native is again surrounded with the kind of promising young talent that could mean a Minnesota return playoffs this year for the first time since 2010.

Baseball lost a Hall of Famer and a lot more with the passing of Jim Bunning on Friday. A star with the the Tigers and then the Phillies, and only the second pitcher to win 100 games and strike out 1000 batters in each league, he won 224 games and struck out 2855 over his 17 seasons. And while he came to the majors as a Tiger, he made his greatest mark for Philadelphia -- on Father's Day 1964, he threw a perfect game against the Mets at Shea Stadium. And I was lucky enough to be there. Having the Phillies ace dominate the Stengel-era Mets was not a shock. So as Bunning's team pulled away and extended their lead, the outcome seemed inevitable. Sitting in the Upper Deck at Shea, slightly to the right of home plate, I still recall my father turning to me and saying, "Do you realize what's happening, this is very special?" I knew it was still a no hitter but hadn't heard the term perfect game used before. By the eighth inning, the crowd at Shea had begun root...

...you share it with the longest tenured manager in Mets history, Terry Collins. Never considered a great tactician or shrewd handler of pitchers, his greatest strength is building team spirit and clubhouse cohesion. His brand of leadership -- bolstered by talent such as Yoenis Cespedes, Curtis Granderson, Noah Syndergaard and Jacob de Grom -- has paid off in the 2015 National League pennant and a 2016 Wild Card. Ever wondered why he wears number 10? It's a tribute to his friend, the former Pirates, Marlins and Tigers skipper Jim Leyland. Also in today's cake and candles file: Hall of Famers Jeff Bagwell and Frank Thomas.

Before we head into the holiday weekend, I had to devote a post to the dramatic improvement Luis Severino has shown so far in 2017. After a rapid rise through the minors in 2015 -- and some fine starts for the Yanks during August and September, the young Dominican seemed snakebit and then lost when he began 2016 in the rotation. After spending part of the summer trying to recapture his form, he returned mid-season as a reliever. He quickly took to that role, leading some observers (and, yes I am one of them) to wonder if his future home would be the bullpen. Give Joe Girardi and pitching coach Larry Rothschild credit. They kept believing in Severino's potential as a front-end starter. And their confidence has been repaid by several outstanding efforts this season -- none better than Wednesday night's eight dominant innings of shutout ball against the Royals. While every team is eager to develop its young pitching, based on recent results, the Yankees are doing an above-av...

Here's another gem from my pal Dennis' collection. The official program from the 2000 World Series, the only time that the Mets and Yankees have clashed in baseball's Fall Classic. Notice that while the Series logo was modern, the sketch of the generic player is retro, hinting at the 1940s and '50s when the World Series often matched a pair of New York clubs.