Arano (elbow) felt good after a live batting practice session Saturday and remains hopeful that he'll be ready for Opening Day, Matt Breen of The Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
Previous reports indicated that Arano wasn't expected to return from arthroscopic elbow surgery until early in the regular season, but the pitcher himself evidently disagrees with those reports. A player's own optimism about his health shouldn't be taken as gospel, though, and he's yet to pitch in a Grapefruit League game, so the odds appear to be against him. Still, the 25-year-old, who owns a career 2.65 ERA in 74.2 innings, should be pitching in a fairly high-leverage role at some point early in the season.