If the first step toward solving a problem is admitting you have a problem, Stephen Strasburg crossed an important bridge at some point during his 24-day stint on the disabled list.
“Sometimes you’ve just got to take a step back to realize how bad it was,” the right-hander said. “Once I did, I was able to get back to what my body was supposed to feel like, instead of trying to just mentally grind through it. I feel a lot stronger, and it feels a lot more consistent now.”
Strasburg said this early Wednesday morning, after he and everyone else at Nationals Park had waited out a 2-hour, 12-minute rain delay, one final hold-up before he could take the mound for the first time since May 29 and prove to himself and the world he still has what it takes to be one of baseball’s most dynamic pitchers.