The Yankees struck out on their original guess regarding superstar Aaron Judge’s rib condition since they first rather hopefully termed his situation “day to day.” That is going to be at least 30 days short, and likely a lot more than that.

That’s OK, but they better not fall to 0-for-2. They need to be right this time in their new prediction that Judge is “expected” back this season following his unhappy fractured rib diagnosis. The captain’s minions (a.k.a. the other players) are plenty good enough to maintain a playoff position, but it doesn’t take an analytics genius to know they are going to need their main guy back eventually if they are going to win their first World Series since 2009.

Maybe the Yankees’ consistently optimistic view of things is contagious because, from here, it does seem like this setback is survivable, assuming Judge does return in 2026. There will be a lot of nervous folks when doctors take and review new images 4-6 weeks from now, but if that goes well, it would seem that he could be back within a couple of weeks after that. (Though, curiously, they wouldn’t put any timetable at all on any possible return, which seemed especially odd for a team that likes to throw around that worthless “day to day” cliché.)

Here’s a closer look at why the Yankees should be OK as long as Judge is OK to play before the year is out.