Sabathia Feeling Good About His Injured Knee

Yankees pitcher CC Sabathia is making progress with his injured knee.

That's the message he sent while talking with the YES Network earlier this month, telling Yankees Magazine the wound no longer limits him in his baseball-related activities. It became clear Sabathia was suffering from the degenerative condition after a May game in Milwaukee, eventually causing him to miss the rest of the season.

"It feels good," Sabathia said. "For me, I have no complaints. I'm able to do all of my workouts, play catch and do everything. So I'm excited about how it feels."

It's a safe bet the Yankees are too after hearing that, as Sabathia is one of the biggest question marks on the team going into 2015. Masahiro Tanaka, Michael Pineda and Ivan Nova also missed good amounts of time last year, but Nova is coming off the much more common Tommy John surgery and Tanaka and Pineda were both able to return to the mound in September.

Indeed, Sabathia's issue is a unique one, and it's difficult to predict how he'll come back from it.

"I've been doing everything I can to stay active," he said. "I've been working out, playing catch, I'll just continue to do that all this offseason and be ready to go."

When next season begins, it's probable Sabathia will be penciled in as the Yankees' third starter, behind Tanaka and Pineda and in front of Nathan Eovaldi and Chris Capuano.

Eovaldi is a youngster of whom the Yankees just want to learn the capabilities, so it's unlikely he'll be expected to dominate much. Capuano is really just a fill-in until Nova gets back in May, so the same presumably goes for him.

That being said, it can be fairly assumed the Yankees will need Sabathia to perform well if they want to start the year off on the right foot, hard as that may be for him.