The Big League Sabrowski

Erik Sabrowski has spent a good piece of his life gripping a baseball.

And after making his Major League Baseball debut with the Cleveland Guardians the lefty pitcher wasn't about to let go of the ball from his first MLB strikeout.

“You see it sometimes when people throw it into the stands and I was like, ‘No, I’ve worked too hard for that to watch that one get away,'” Sabrowski told reporters after the game, which saw him log 1.1 innings and record two strikeouts, allow one hit and permit no runs over 27 pitches.

“That’s a ball I’m going to hold onto for the rest of my life.”

Sabrowski - who spent two seasons as a two-way star with the Edmonton Prospects - was recalled by the Guardians on Aug. 28th but had to wait patiently for his first opportunity to face major-league hitters.

With the team entrenched in a race for top spot in the American League (AL) Central, Sabrowski bided his time, learning as much as he could from some of the veteran Guardians relievers.

Finally, with the Guardians down 4-1 to the Kansas City Royals in the bottom of the seventh inning at Kauffman Stadium on Sept. 4th, the southpaw was summoned.

“It felt amazing,” Sabrowski said during a post-game interview.

“Yeah, it was a few days, but I just kept telling myself to stay ready and my time was going to come, and fortunately it happened tonight.”

Facing Yuli Gurriel, Sabrowski uncorked a high pitch that sailed to the backstop and allowed Bobby Witt Jr. to move over to third base.

Sabrowski calmed down and got Gurriel to strike out swinging to end the threat.

“I just had to remind myself that it was a baseball game,” the southpaw said.

“Yeah, the stage is bigger but I’ve thrown lots of pitches in my life … just take a deep breath and don’t do that again, hopefully.”

He wouldn’t, as he came back out in the eighth inning to strike out Paul DeJong, got Robbie Grossman to fly out, allowed a double to Mikael Garcia, then ended the inning with a pop-out from Freddy Fermin.

After the game, Sabrowski was overcome with emotion thinking about the journey to the big leagues.

“There are so many people that are a part of today,” Sabrowski said. “I’m just fortunate to have all of them for a real special day.”

In particular, he singled out his fiancée, Renee.

“She’s been going through this ride that I’ve been on and it’s just as much her day as it is mine,” he said.

PLAYING WITH THE PROSPECTS

Sabrowski was a standout player on the mound and in the batter's box when he played for the Prospects in the Western Major Baseball League (WMBL), the predecessor to the Western Canadian Baseball League.

During the 2016 WMBL season, Sabrowski recorded a .271 batting average, 22 runs and 17 runs batted in (RBI) during 41 games as a hitter, while registering a 5-2 record with a 3.30 earned run average (ERA) and 47 Ks in 60 innings as a pitcher.

The following year, Sabrowski appeared in 35 regular-season contests and another 10 playoff games for the Edmonton Prospects. As a pitcher, he went 5-3 with a 2.47 ERA and 65 strikeouts over 54.2 innings. The 6-foot-4 star also impressed at the plate by batting .327 with 28 RBI and 24 runs over 165 at bats.

Sabrowski was taken in the 14th round of the 2018 MLB Draft by the San Diego Padres.

Soon after, he went through his first elbow surgery, putting him on the shelf for the better part of a year.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic threw a wrench into his plans for a return, but it also gave Sabrowski more time to heal.

He returned in 2021 with the Fort Wayne Tincaps, going 2-0 with a 1.86 earned-run average in eight games.

However, something didn’t feel right and Sabrowski was forced to undergo a second Tommy John surgery that October.

Just a month later, he was taken by the Guardians in the Rule 5 Draft, giving him a vote of confidence that they were willing to be patient with him as he recovered.

Sabrowski made his Guardians’ organizational debut with the Double-A Akron RubberDucks in 2023, going 4-0 with a 2.49 ERA in 20 relief appearances, striking out 28 in 21-plus innings.

In the fall, he continued to impress by posting a 1.86 ERA with 16 punchouts in over nine innings of work with the Peoria Javelinas of the Arizona Fall League.

The Guardians were impressed with Sabrowksi coming out of Spring Training 2024, starting him with the Triple-A Columbus Clippers for a trio of games before he was returned to Akron.

He continued to dominate at that level, going 0-1 with a 0.77 ERA and 26 strikeouts in nine relief appearances to earn a promotion back to Columbus, where he continued to pitch well ahead of his late-August call to the big leagues.

Sabrowski is the second alumni of the Edmonton Prospects to play at the MLB level. 

Kody Funderburk, another two-way threat in the WMBL, was a teammate of Sabrowski's in Edmonton in 2016. The two competed against each other in the 2017 playoffs after Funderburk joined the Okotoks Dawgs. 

Funderburk made his MLB debut with the Minnesota Twins in 2023 and has since appeared in 37 big-league games and worked over 45 innings of relief as a lefty pitcher over the last two seasons.