The latest on Justin Steele is still positive news – well, relative to him needing an Injured List stint for his forearm issue in the first place.
Steele’s progress, as of this moment, still has him on track to return after a minimum-length stay on the IL:
None of that guarantees that Justin Steele will actually return to pitch in a big league game on June 17, but if the Cubs have that as the target ten days out, then that means they do feel good about where he is. You’d have to tailor the throwing progression from here to meet that date, and you couldn’t do that if he wasn’t just about ready to throw relatively intense bullpens.
How Steele recovers the next day at that point will tell us a lot about whether the tightness/discomfort in the forearm has truly abated, but for now, I do like hearing that the Cubs have a very specific return date in mind. That’s usually a good sign about how a guy is feeling, as opposed to the times you get very general or guarded or even hopeful language.