Justin Verlander is again. The Astros introduced Wednesday that the 41-year-old right-hander has been reinstated from the injured listing. Fellow righty Seth Martinez was optioned to Triple-A Sugar Land in his place. Verlander will begin right this moment’s dwelling recreation towards the visiting Crimson Sox — his first look since June 9.
Verlander opened the season on the 15-day IL after some shoulder discomfort popped up throughout spring coaching and slowed his development by the annual exhibition season. He was activated on April 19 and made 10 begins out of the Houston rotation earlier than heading again to the 15-day injured listing, this time with a neck challenge that has saved him out a good bit longer than initially anticipated.
On the time of his placement on the IL, Verlander famous that he’d been coping with the difficulty for weeks however added: “If this was playoff time, I’d wish to suppose I’d be on the market.” Regardless of that confidence, Verlander wound up lacking greater than two months with the damage.
When wholesome, Verlander has been a strong however not dominant piece of the Houston rotation. He’s pitched 57 innings with a 3.95 earned run common, displaying a lower-than-usual 21.3% strikeout price and an uncharacteristic susceptibility to dwelling runs (1.74 HR/9). Verlander has seen a slight however hardly main bump in his homer-to-flyball ratio, however the bigger downside is that he’s merely permitting extra flyballs than ever earlier than. This 12 months’s 57% flyball mark trounces each the profession 42% mark he carried into the season and final 12 months’s 44.8% mark.
Even when Verlander doesn’t recapture his Cy Younger type this season, the present model of the right-hander remains to be loads useful for an Astros rotation that has been stretched skinny by an enormous wave of accidents. Verlander’s strikeout price is just a couple of proportion level shy of common, and his command stays fairly robust (7.1% stroll price). He was averaging simply over 5 2/3 innings per begin previous to his second IL placement of the season.
Verlander will step again onto a beginning workers that additionally contains Framber Valdez, Hunter Brown, Ronel Blanco, deadline acquisition Yusei Kikuchi and rookie Spencer Arrighetti. The plan for Houston shifting ahead appears to be to undertake a six-man rotation. That can assist to mitigate issues concerning Verlander’s neck in addition to workload issues for Blanco, who’s already set a brand new career-high for innings pitched, and Arrighetti, who’ll probably set up a brand new career-high throughout his subsequent begin.
Rotation depth past the six presently wholesome starters in Houston is scarce. Cristian Javier and Jose Urquidy underwent Tommy John surgical procedure earlier this season. J.P. France underwent shoulder surgical procedure. The ’Stros not too long ago introduced that righty Luis Garcia is not going to pitch this season. He’d been anticipated to return within the second half after present process his personal Tommy John process early within the 2023 marketing campaign, however didn’t recuperate as rapidly as hoped. Lance McCullers Jr., who underwent flexor surgical procedure final summer time, was additionally anticipated to be a second-half reinforcement however is now equally seen as unlikely to return in 2024.
The prolonged size of Verlander’s stint on the injured listing has successfully eradicated the likelihood that he’ll have the ability to set off the vesting participant choice in his contract. Had Verlander stayed wholesome sufficient to achieve 140 innings this 12 months, he’d have triggered the proper to select up a $35MM participant choice for the 2025 season. The Astros would solely have been on the hook for half of that sum, with the Mets protecting the opposite $17.5MM as a part of the commerce that despatched Verlander from Queens to Houston final summer time.
Now, Verlander will merely turn out to be a free agent at season’s finish. As long as he plans to proceed pitching — he’s beforehand mentioned he hopes to pitch into his mid-40s — there’ll probably be mutual curiosity in a reunion, nevertheless it received’t be as easy as Verlander choosing up that dear participant choice that’ll now not come into play.
