Burrows (elbow) 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 outings with Sugar Land, Burrows is looking more likely to get another chance as a starter for the Astros once he comes off the IL, especially given the current state of the back end of the big-league 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.