Avisail Garcia to the DL; Jason Coats recalled from Triple-A Charlotte

Alex Avila, Austin Jackson, Brett Lawrie, Jake Petricka, Zach Putnam, and Charlie Tilson were already on the disabled list. Now, Avisail Garcia can be added to the list of injured players that shouldn’t be as important to a major league baseball team as they are to the depth-starved White Sox.

Garcia’s sprained right knee is coming at a particularly unfortunate time, as his play had picked up of late. The 25-year-old was hitting .292/.346/.792 since July 30 and probably needs a convincingly strong performance over the last two months of this season to avoid being non-tendered this offseason. With the White Sox all but eliminated from the playoff picture and no other interesting healthy options, letting Garcia soak up at-bats has become a harmless way to give him one last shot to show he belongs. This injury is unfortunately a rather significant blow to his chances.

To take Garcia’s place on the roster, the White Sox recalled Jason Coats from Triple-A Charlotte.  Coats owns a superb .329/.390/.512 line with the Knights in 2016, including a .317/.371/.402 performance since we last saw him in Chicago. However, he didn’t show much in his 29 plate appearances earlier this season with the White Sox (.091/.286/.136 with a 31 percent strikeout rate) so the Quad-A label applies to Coats until he proves it doesn’t.

In other news, Ken Harrelson will be missing both the upcoming Royals and Marlins series with an illness. Tom Paciorek will be on the call with Steve Stone against Kansas City, while Jason Benetti will team up with Paciorek in Miami. The team is hoping Hawk will return when the White Sox take on the Cleveland Indians next week.