Stephen Strasburg made his debut on the national stage Sunday afternoon for the Harrisburg Senators, the Double-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals. Pitching against the Altoona Curve, the minor league team of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Strasburg was at times dominant over five innings of work. He ended the day throwing 82 pitches, allowing one earned run on four hits and two walks while striking out eight.

He started the game hitting 99 miles per hour on the gun for the first two innings before settling in at the 97-98 range over the final three frames. He also threw some nasty slurves that had several right-handed hitters backing up from the plate as the ball dropped in for a strike, as well as throwing in a few change ups that were hitting close to 90. It is always nice to have a change up in your back up pocket that you throw as hard as the speed of a fastball for a good majority of the major league pitchers.

When you add in the factor of all the hoopla surrounding the event (70+ media passes handed out plus an over-capacity crowd) coupled with the fact that Strasburg had not thrown for a week and I would have to say it was a pretty successful outing.

From a fantasy baseball perspective, the Washington Nationals have gone on record lately about Strasburg pitching 150-160 innings this season. If we assume that he is called up around June 1 or so, after 8-10 starts in the minor leagues, that would probably leave him with around 90-100 innings or so to pitch in the big leagues this season.