The Cubs are approaching a situation they haven’t been in all year with their rotation: healthy.

With Jameson Taillon making his season debut Friday against the Marlins, the Cubs are only without Opening Day starter Justin Steele — and he could be nearing a return, too. Steele is scheduled to face hitters in a live batting practice on Sunday, manager Craig Counsell said, with a potential rehab assignment following that.

“It’s possible,” Counsell said prior to Friday’s opener against Miami. “Live BP, the next step is generally [rehab assignment.]”

While Steele isn’t back yet, there’s already a trickledown effect being felt in the pitching staff with just Taillon’s return. When he was activated, Hayden Wesneski was optioned to make room on the 26-man roster, meaning the current 5-man rotation is still with the big-league club. Taillon, for his part, looked solid in his first outing, allowing just a run on 3 hits with 4 strikeouts in 5 innings of work on Friday afternoon. 

With Shota Imanaga and Javier Assad starting on Saturday and Kyle Hendricks opening Sunday’s finale, the question mark then becomes Ben Brown. 

The rookie was stellar in his last start, allowing just a run on 1 hit with 4 strikeouts in 6 innings. After allowing 6 earned runs in his debut (1.2 innings), Brown has settled in. He has allowed 2 runs in 14.2 innings with 14 strikeouts in that time. 

For now, Brown will be available out of the Cubs’ bullpen during the series against Miami which includes a doubleheader on Saturday. Hendricks, amidst his struggles (12.71 ERA, 2.24 WHIP) will keep his place in the rotation with the Cubs hopeful he can change course as the season progresses. 

“We’re just covering innings every day,” Counsell said. “I think the thought really is that Ben will be involved in one of these games coming up here and we’ll kind of use that to mitigate the doubleheader, essentially. Where he pitches in the game, kind of undecided, yet. We got enough innings to cover that the fact that he is stretched out is going to help us.

“I expect him to get outs.”

Thursday’s rainout provided an extra day for Counsell to reset a bullpen that had been taxed in the final days of their West Coast road trip. Some of that was alleviated by Wesneski’s 4 shutout innings in relief on Wednesday, but the extra day off didn’t hurt, either.

Now, Brown will be used to help cover innings if the need arises. That could come Saturday, when the Cubs will have 18 innings to work through.

Early on this season, though, the Cubs have shown that pitching depth can step up to the occasion.

“I think the young guys have come up and they’ve done a really good job, but we’re gonna have more injuries,” president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer said. “We’re gonna have more things happen during the course of the season and more doubleheaders and we’re gonna need everyone to be able to pitch in.”