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We learned a few days ago that Gio Gonzalez would make his long-awaited return to the roster tonight against the Arizona Diamondbacks, and this afternoon the Milwaukee Brewers officially announced his activation from the injured list:
LHP Gio Gonzalez has been reinstated from the 10-day injured list. He will start tonight at Arizona. RHP Burch Smith has been optioned to Triple-A San Antonio. pic.twitter.com/CdPvcZWPme
— Milwaukee Brewers (@Brewers) July 20, 2019
Gonzalez signed in late April after opting out of his minor league deal with the Yankees and made six starts for the Cream City Nine, totaling 31.0 innings of 3.19 ERA baseball with 26 strikeouts versus nine walks. He went on the IL with a dead arm near the end of May and wound up missing nearly two months of action. He made two minor league rehab starts before rejoining the big league club, allowing a pair of runs in 2.0 innings for the Class A-Advanced Mudcats and then one run in 4.2 innings for the Triple-A Missions. His return to the rotation will be a welcome one, as Milwaukee’s starters tallied a 5.00 ERA in 44 games during Gio’s absence.
Gonzalez will take the place of Burch Smith on the big league roster after he threw 2.0 shutout innings in yesterday’s loss to Arizona. Smith has allowed six earned runs in 10.2 MLB innings this year (with five of those coming during one 2.0 inning outing against the Pirates on July 6th), but he owns a stellar 2.53 ERA along with a 77:34 K/BB ratio in 67.2 innings for the club’s Triple-A affiliate this season.
Statistics courtesy of Fangraphs