When Royals manager Ned Yost revealed on Saturday that outfielder Lorenzo Cain recently received a stem-cell injection to treat his sprained left wrist, it might have left some confused.
Wait, stem cells? Is that legal?
The answer is yes — at least in the United States — and the treatment method, while somewhat new, is more prevalent in professional sports than you might think.
First, the stem cells used in sports medicine are different than the ones that have become embroiled in political debate in the United States. The contentious ones are human embryonic stem cells that come from unused embryos.