After a homer and a single in his latest rehab/ramp-up game with the Iowa Cubs, it sounds like Seiya Suzuki will be back with the Chicago Cubs soon.
Cubs president Jed Hoyer sure seemed to suggest it this week, and Suzuki himself confirmed it after the I-Cubs game:
No specifics there on precisely when Suzuki will make his season debut with the Cubs, who are off today. The team is in Los Angeles this weekend for a series with the Dodgers. It would make the most sense for Suzuki to simply return on Friday, but I’ll take what I can get.
To that end, the Cubs are going to have some roster maneuvering to do when Suzuki is activated. They are currently at just seven relievers, which I can’t imagine will last too much longer. So when Suzuki returns, the Cubs may also bring a reliever with him (would Brandon Hughes be ready by then?), which means two position players would get bumped. Nelson Velazquez, as the last man up, might be one of the two, with the Miles Mastrobuoni, Edwin Rios, Luis Torrens group the next possible set of options. I tend to think, at this point, Nick Madrigal isn’t going to Iowa any time soon.
Seems like it would be nice to keep Velazquez up so that the Cubs actually have a back-up outfielder on the roster (who plays center field right now to give Cody Bellinger a day off?), but if the Cubs were willing to go with just TWO outfielders, it’s hard to say they’re going to jump to four.