A few hours before the Angels’ game Friday night, Shohei Ohtani’s status as a pitcher was uncertain.
By the time he got through pregame activities, however, the two-way star was already scheduled for his next pitching start.
Ohtani will take the mound Sunday, the Angels announced, two days after he was scratched from a scheduled Friday start because of arm soreness.
After manager Joe Maddon said in his afternoon media scrum that he didn’t know “if it’s going to be possible to throw [Ohtani] again or not” before the end of the season, Ohtani took the field pregame and completed a full slate of activities.
He went through throwing drills against an outfield wall, a staple of his between starts routine this year. He then played catch in the outfield for several minutes. And finally, he went into the bullpen for a 32-pitch session.
It marked a stark turnaround for Ohtani, who was scratched from Friday’s start after experiencing general soreness in his pitching arm following a game of catch earlier this week.
While Maddon didn’t initially guarantee Ohtani would return this season, and said he even broached the topic of shutting things down with the right-hander himself, the manager was also hopeful Ohtani was just experiencing normal late-season fatigue.
He still wanted to see Ohtani pitch again before the year was up.
And as it turns out, he isn’t going to have to wait long for the 27-year-old to return to the mound after all.
