PHILADELPHIA -- Bryce Miller had some reflective perspective when discussing his much-anticipated return from the injured list, slated for Tuesday night against the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park.
On the one hand, it has been a brutal year filled with pain in the right-hander’s pitching elbow, a setback that necessitated a second IL stint and a lack of production that at times made him a liability in the Mariners’ rotation. Yet on the other, if Miller can regain some semblance of his 2024 form down the stretch and help Seattle reach the postseason, he’ll look back on this year through a drastically different lens.
“I can't change what's already been done,” Miller said, “and my only goal moving forward is not to get my ERA down to three-something or any of that. It's just go out, compete, finish strong and get us into the postseason and see how far we can go. And whatever the numbers are at the end, for me, it is what it is.
“We'll restart next year. But I just want to go out and finish strong and go out and pitch like I know I can.”
Based on the schedule’s mathematics – and with the Mariners intending for Miller to operate on a six-day routine for now – he could make roughly six more starts in the regular season. If Seattle does play into October, his role could shift to the bullpen in a shortened series. But those conversations aren’t taking place yet.
“It sucks missing as much time as I did, but on the bright side, I've come in and should be fresh for the last couple months to be able to not feel like I'm going downhill,” Miller said. “Last year, I was better the second half but still grinding.”
Miller was up to 98.1 mph with his four-seam fastball velocity in his final rehab start with Triple-A Tacoma on Wednesday while averaging 96.7 mph, a sizable 2.2 mph up from his season average. Velocity is only one component to illustrate health, especially given the potential strains that his specific secondaries feature, such as the slider and splitter. But both of those have felt good, too.
At the outset of this second IL stint, Miller was cognizant that he wouldn’t have a full assessment about his arm’s health until he was pitching deeper into games, as his pain didn’t persist earlier this year until he reached later innings. But that concern doesn’t appear to be the case anymore after he cleared 5 2/3 innings and reached 76 pitches (51 strikes) in his final outing with Tacoma.
“Earlier in the year, around that point, I'm like sprinting for 94 [mph] and trying max effort,” Miller said.
In three starts for the Rainiers, Miller surrendered six runs on seven hits and three walks with 15 strikeouts over 13 1/3 innings, good for a 4.05 ERA and an opponents’ slash line of .149/.200/.426 (.626 OPS).
Miller hasn’t pitched in a big league game since June 6 at Angel Stadium, when he surrendered five runs that ballooned his season ERA (5.73) and opponents’ OPS (.800). He received a platelet-rich plasma shot at the beginning of the second IL stint and a cortisone shot at the outset of the first in mid-May.
“I didn't want to get too excited until I got into the game and got deep and didn't flare up on me,” Miller said. “So far, it's felt great.”