Rangers' Yu Darvish misses start with sore neck

Yu Darvish finished second in the AL Cy Young Award voting last season. (Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images)

Yu Darvish missed his scheduled start in a minor league game on Friday with a stiff neck, according to T.R. Sullivan of MLB.com. He is still on track to start Opening Day, March 31 against the Phillies.

"I slept on it wrong," Darvish said. "If I have two or three days it will be fine."

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Darvish is 29-18 with a 3.34 ERA in 61 starts in his two seasons with the Rangers. He is a two-time All-Star and finished second in the AL Cy Young Award voting last season, in which he threw 209 2/3 innings.

He was scheduled to throw 90 pitches on Friday.

The stiffness is not related to the back problems he had at the end of last season, according to Sullivan.

"If a guy says something wrong and you try to push him out there, and something happens, well, that's something you could have prevented," said manager Ron Washington. "That's why you err on the side of caution. We've got to get him right."

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