Chicago Cubs: Justin Steele delivers great injury update news

“I’m feeling very good,” Steele said. “Bullpens have been progressing well lately. I’m throwing two a week, Tuesdays (plus) Fridays and/or Saturdays. I had one yesterday (Friday), recovering well from that. The next one will be 35 pitches. Throwing four-seam, sinkers, and sliders right now. I’m gonna be introducing changeups into the bullpens next week, I believe. At that point, I’ll be at curveballs to catch play. That’s kind of the progression were going with as far as getting pitches back into the game mound.”

This isn’t the first reporting of Steele’s recovery being a bit ahead of schedule. Steele, himself, has previously talked about how good he feels.

An ahead-of-schedule Steele, though, does present an interesting dilemma for manager Craig Counsell.

A good dilemma to have

Would the Cubs consider bringing him back into the rotation earlier than the mid-season return previously targeted? With five capable and healthy (as of this moment) starters in the rotation (Matthew Boyd, Cade Horton, Edward Cabrera, Jameson Taillon, Shota Imanaga) and two quality reserves (Colin Rea, Javier Assad), there’s really no burning need for them to hurry Steele back into the mix.

The best move would probably be to target that mid-season return and limit innings for awhile, in hopes of getting Steele at 100% for the end of the season and through the playoffs.

With the goal of making a deep postseason run, the Cubs would definitely like to see Steele back on the mound at 100%. Over the last four years, he’s been Chicago’s most reliable and effective starter, posting a 3.18 ERA over 82 starts.

The idea of the team going to a six-man rotation or possibly piggybacking starters in a single game to keep pitchers fresh and healthy has been brought up, especially in connection with Steele and how they may want to handle his return.

No rush to bring Steele back

But, again, there’s no rush, right now, to wedge him into the rotation before it’s absolutely safe to do so.

This isn’t Steele’s first time dealing with major surgery to his throwing arm. Back in 2017, when he was still a minor league prospect, he underwent full Tommy John surgery. That experience is helping him get through this latest recovery process.

Late last month, Steele talked about the depth of the Cubs’ rotation and how that affords him the opportunity to recover properly and at a healthy pace.

“That definitely eases your mind,” Steele said. “Knowing that it’s not a race to get back for Opening Day or something…So there’s definitely some comfortability knowing that I don’t have to rush.”

Currently, projections for his comeback range from late May to the All-Star break.