TACOMA, Wash. -- Logan Gilbert admittedly carried some rust into his first rehab start at Triple-A Tacoma on Thursday night, but it was nonetheless a positive step in the right direction as the Mariners’ towering ace works his way back from the injured list.
Gilbert recorded only five outs before reaching 45 pitches, at which point he was relieved, having surrendered one run on two walks and two hits while tallying three strikeouts among 10 batters faced.
His fastball topped out at 96.8 mph, on his second pitch, before settling in the 94-95 mph range for the rest of the night. He generated seven whiffs on 15 swings but also a few notable misses, with first-pitch strikes to only five batters while throwing 20 balls overall, many of which were to the glove side.
Again, some of these kinks were to be expected.
“I felt fine, my arm feels pretty good, solid,” Gilbert said. “It kind of feels like Spring Training a little bit. We talked about it. The stuff feels fine. A couple of close misses, and just need to be in the zone a lot more. Just like spring, it takes a couple to get synced up. It's kind of how it feels. But the arm felt good.”
Of note, he mixed in his splitter a few times -- the pitch that he intends to be more delicate and deliberate with, given the potential stress it can add on the mild elbow flexor strain that he suffered on April 25 and led him to being placed on the IL for the first time in his career.
“Just to see how it feels, and out here, just try to treat it like normal,” Gilbert said. “And that's what I was doing. So everything was gamespeed and felt fine throwing it normal, not taking off on any splitters or anything else.”
Gilbert tweaked his pregame routine some on Thursday with extra warmup throws given that he was on an abbreviated pitch count.
“I was letting it rip,” Gilbert said. “I was kind of falling off the mound a little bit, too. So that's kind of the out-of-sync I was talking about, where usually I like to get my direction through the catcher. I was kind of falling off a little bit. But I don't feel like it's far off.”
In a fun aside, Gilbert warmed up with Mariners bullpen catcher Justin Novak, who went through stretch drills back in Seattle before the Mariners’ game vs. the Nationals then made the 35-mile trek through brutal traffic to Tacoma and bounced after Gilbert was done in order to make it back in case he was needed.
“He's a grinder,” Gilbert said of Novak, who’s widely viewed as the good-vibes guy in the clubhouse. “He loves the game.”
Gilbert will make at least one more rehab start with Tacoma and is expected to pitch on a six-day routine for the foreseeable future. That’d put him in line to throw next Wednesday vs. Sacramento at Cheney Stadium, with the hope of upping his volume near 60 pitches, which would then put his outing after that to the 75-pitch range, the workload needed to return to the big league rotation.
“I don't know if that's the plan, but I think after one more, I should be feeling ready to go,” Gilbert said.
Once Gilbert returns, the Mariners’ rotation -- which has seen him, George Kirby and Bryce Miller on the IL already this season -- should be at full strength, as Miller is set to be activated on Saturday and start vs. the Twins. Kirby returned on May 22 and has made two starts.
The club has been firm on not using a six-man rotation despite having the personnel to do so, meaning they’ll have to make a decision soon on Emerson Hancock, who was again solid on Thursday when surrendering two runs in 5 1/3 innings before relieved by Gabe Speier against red-hot James Wood in a left-on-left matchup. Wood then ripped a two-run double off Speier to give the Nats the game’s first lead.
“We have so many arms,” Gilbert said, “It's a good problem to have.”