Steele\u2019s comeback journey<\/a>. Hottovy was looking for repeatability in Steele\u2019s delivery to make sure his mechanics remain sound. Steele\u2019s fastball showed both the cut and life on the pitch the Cubs are used to seeing from Steele, which was an encouraging sign.<\/p>\nAdvertisement<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it went as well as he could have wanted it and hoped for it to go,\u201d Hottovy said. \u201cNow it\u2019s just continuing to build off every outing, every live BP and making sure we don\u2019t get too far ahead of ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
Steele didn\u2019t feel any anxiety in the buildup to facing hitters like he had during his return from his first Tommy John surgery in 2017. He appreciated teammates and coaches showing up to the stadium to watch his live BP. Busch congratulated him after they finished for getting to this point in his recovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith this one, it\u2019s kind of been smooth sailing as far as the rehab process has been going,\u201d Steele said. \u201cAs soon as I started throwing bullpens, however long ago it was, I was kind of like, \u2018I feel like I could face hitters right now.\u2019 It was a very similar feeling as to what it was before surgery, so there wasn\u2019t really an adjustment period for it.\u201d<\/p>\n
For as good as Steele\u2019s stuff felt Thursday, he\u2019s not looking too far ahead. The Cubs are going to be deliberate in his buildup knowing he will have some form of an innings limit this season. Both sides want to make sure he\u2019s available for playoff baseball and potentially a deep run in October.<\/p>\n
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Going forward, Steele will for the most part remain on a typical five-day starter schedule as he continues ramping up. There might be opportunities for Steele to get additional work in the pitching lab or spend time working on stuff in a bullpen session, but otherwise the Cubs are moving forward with Steele getting into his normal routine.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re obviously very excited with where I\u2019m at and how I\u2019m feeling,\u201d Steele said. \u201cWe\u2019re doing a really good job of keeping a level head throughout this process.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MESA, Ariz. \u2014 Justin Steele stepped off the back of the mound at Sloan Park, gathered himself with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":622777,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2399],"tags":[5,735,138,24,4245,161,515,875,393,2000,37,4,4271,6961],"class_list":["post-622776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-chicago-cubs","tag-baseball","tag-cade-horton","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-chicagocubs","tag-cubs","tag-gavin-hollowell","tag-jordan-wicks","tag-justin-steele","tag-matthew-boyd","tag-michael-busch","tag-mlb","tag-the-cubs","tag-tommy-hottovy"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116225299548296708","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622776"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622776\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/622777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}