Braves Move Chris Sale's Rehab Start Back to Gwinnett

A slight change in the plans came about for where the Atlanta Braves lefty will make his third rehab start

Sale is almost back, just has to work his way back elsewhere | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

Weather has forced the Atlanta Braves to change their plans for Chris Sale's upcoming rehab start. He's now traveling to Memphis to pitch for Triple-A Gwinnett.

He was scheduled to pitch on Saturday for Double-A Columbus before the impending weather. He will still pitch on Saturday. The goal is still the same, and that's to get him to 75 pitches. He threw 56 in his last start.

Once he's at 75 pitches, he'll likely be activated and re-join the team.

Both of his first two rehab starts were with Triple-A Gwinnett on home field. The goal was to keep him in a home ballpark, hence why he went down to Columbus.

While the Braves aren't focused on this, there is a plus to keeping the level of competition consistent during the ramp up period. It could give him a more accurate idea of where he is at.

If his last two starts are an indicator of anything, Sale will likely take another step forward in his perforamance along with the increased pitch count. In his last start, he pitched four innings, allowing an earned run on three hits and a walk while striking out four.

He got into trouble in the first inning, with the run and every baserunner he allowed coming within the first two-thirds of an inning pitched. Once he settled in, he sat down the final 10 batters that he faced.

It was a solid improvement off the two innings pitched in his first rehab start where he also allowed an earned run on three hits (but with two walks). The pitches he needed per inning decreased from 20 to 14.

Once Sale comes back, there will be a slighty increased sense of normalcy around the Braves clubhouse. Getting at least one more player back this season would be nice for them.

They already won't get Austin Riley back, or Spencer Schwellenbach, or Joe Jimenez, or Grant Holmes and so forth. Along with Acuña once again coming back from the injured list recently, the Braves will likely again get the feeling that at least something is going their way on the injury front.

Before is injury, Sale was one of the pitchers in baseball for a nice 10-game stretch. He had a 1.23 ERA in his last 10 starts before going on the injured list, lowering his season ERA from 6.17 to 2.52. Arguably, he was getting back in the Cy Young race before going down, but we'll never know.

At this point, he'll be happy to finish the season healthy, something he didn't even do ahead of winning his first Cy Young last fall.