McGowan's new normal

DUNEDIN, Fla. – Simply being one of the guys right now is an achievement for Dustin McGowan.

There is no special throwing program for him to follow so far this spring training, no workload limit to keep track of, no restrictions to hold him back. His preparations for the 2012 season are no different than those of every other starting pitcher in camp for the Toronto Blue Jays.

"It’s the way things have been going," McGowan said with a wide smile Tuesday in the Florida Auto Exchange Stadium clubhouse. "It’s been a normal schedule, throwing sides regular like everybody else, covering regular.

"Everything is good right now."

Still baby-faced and filled with youthful enthusiasm at 29, McGowan certainly has good reason to relish his newfound normalcy.

On the heels of an admirable and remarkable comeback to the big-leagues from a pair of shoulder surgeries that sidelined him for nearly 3.5 years, he arrived at camp completely healthy, without an injury to rehab or in need of a delicate buildup process, for the first time since 2008.

He’s no longer taking the mound with fingers crossed and breaths held all around. Instead, he’s just another strong-armed hurler fighting for a job, with a provisional hold on the fifth spot in an uncertain rotation that can dearly use his full return to form.

"He’s being treated like a normal starter," said pitching coach Bruce Walton. "We’re going to evaluate sides and days after sides a little bit, but that’s it, and we do that with a lot of the starters anyway.

"If they’re not feeling real good, we might back their side up a little bit, but we’re getting him in shape just like everybody else."

The lingering question of course – as it has been during each of his previous abortive attempts to return since walking off the Rogers Centre mound July 8, 2008 with a labrum tear in his right shoulder – is can it really last this time?

McGowan has never gotten this far before, throwing 35.1 innings during 12 minor-league rehab outings last year before logging 21 impressive big-league frames over five games, four starts, in September.

His stuff, sitting in the 92-95 m.p.h. range, was reminiscent of the front-of-the-rotation repertoire he featured before his injury woes began, a package that had him headed toward stardom.

Manager John Farrell says what he saw last September was "not far off" from how McGowan used to look, albeit without the same crispness and command. And Walton added: "The stuff was as close as I could imagine."

Asked what he read into the way his stuff looked, McGowan replied, "It told me I still had it."

"I don’t think I was quite 100 per cent yet, there were times it was really good, there times it was OK, but I figured a good off-season would help heal things up and rest everything completely," he continued, adding later: "Where I was at last year, I’ll take that all day. I don’t expect to be like I was five years ago; scientifically I don’t think it’s possible to get back there after all the surgeries I’ve had."

Still, the feeling that his shoulder is a ticking time bomb, moving steadily toward an undetermined detonation point, remains hard to shake.

At this point it’s impossible to know whether he’s actually in the clear, or whether his arm is going to blow for the final time, and all the Blue Jays can realistically do is keep running him out on the mound and hope he holds up (particularly because he is out of options and can’t be sent to the minors without passing through waivers).

Either way, McGowan has learned to stop fretting over his status and do only what his body allows him, an approach he says has helped him, "a lot."

That perspective was provided by his wife Jillyann and daughter Mackenzie, and helped him through his toughest days, while the recent arrival of seven-week-old daughter Brooklyn has only reinforced to him that being on a mound isn’t the be-all, end-all.

"I’ve got enough to worry about, I’ve got a wife, kids, they’re my biggest worries," he said. "Baseball? I’ve learned you’ve got to put (the health worries) on the backburner, just like whether you have a bad outing or a good outing, you’ve got to forget about it either way."

Better instead to focus on giving his team good things to remember, something he’ll need to do over the next six weeks with the Blue Jays planning to use 10 starters to open the pre-season.

Over that time, McGowan will find out more about what kind of pitcher he is now, while Farrell and the coaching staff will get a read on what he’s got to offer.

"Any time a pitcher goes through what he’s gone through, you’re going to go through a little bit of a learning curve again to pitch effectively with the stuff you have now versus pre-injury, but he’s a smart kid, and he’s making those adjustments along the way," said Farrell.

"The fact that we have more information about him, gives us a starting point this camp head and shoulders above where we were a year ago with him."

Shi Davidi is the MLB Insider for sportsnet.ca. Come back to read his insight and opinion regularly.