The wait is almost over.
After tearing his ACL during spring training, an injury that was expected to sideline him for the remainder of the season, Marcus Stroman is set to make his 2015 debut Saturday. In the middle of a pennant race. Against the division rival Bronx Bombers at Yankee Stadium. It doesn’t get much more dramatic than that.
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Toronto entered Tuesday with a half-game lead on the Yankees for first place in the American League East.
Stroman, 24, pitched to mixed results over two rehab starts, the latest coming Monday when he tossed three innings of four-run ball with four walks and five strikeouts before reaching his pitch limit. He insisted he felt great, though, and is now slated to pitch in a Blue Jays uniform this upcoming weekend in the highest-stakes game of his career.
Stroman will replace a banged up Mark Buehrle, who’s getting a breather and heading back to Toronto to receive a cortisone shot.
Coming off a tremendous rookie season in which he posted a 3.65 ERA and 1.17 WHIP over 130 2/3 innings largely out of the rotation, Stroman was a favourite to take the ball Opening Day for Toronto before a freak accident during a pitchers’ fielding practice in March forced him to undergo left knee surgery.
After a gruelling six months of rehab, the right-hander is getting thrown into the fire against the never-count-them-out Yankees and entering Toronto’s rotation—at least temporarily—as the team looks to end the majors’ longest playoff drought and make the postseason for the first time since 1993.
Stroman stated in March, after learning of his grim diagnosis, that his return shall be legendary. Talk about hitting the nail on the head.
No pressure.
