Burrows struck out five and permitted one hit and two walks over 4.2 scoreless innings in a rehab start with Triple-A Sugar Land on Thursday.
After submitting a 5.99 ERA and 1.55 WHIP in 18 appearances (17 starts) for Houston to begin the season, Burrows was on his way to a demotion before landing on the injured list July 13 due to right elbow neuritis. However, after posting an 8:3 K:BB while allowing just four hits over nine innings between a pair of rehab starts with Sugar Land, Burrows is looking more likely to get another chance once he comes off the IL, especially given the current state of the back end of the Astros' rotation. Burrows was able to build up to 78 pitches Thursday, so he should be able to handle a standard workload if he ends up rejoining the rotation next week.