White Sox Minor League Update: November 5, 2021

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Today was a much better day in the sun than yesterday was for the AFL Sox players, their combined efforts helping to propel the Desert Dogs to another defeat of the hated Surprise Saguaros. Yoelqui Céspedes got the day off after a forgettable day at the plate yesterday, and second baseman José Rodríguez supplanted him batting second in the lineup. This was a more typical Rodríguez game, his 2-for-4 day raising his average to .255. He knocked in the Dogs’ first run in the first inning, hitting his first AFL triple to score Cardinals prospect Lars Nootbaar from a leadoff single. He had another RBI in the fifth, singling to score (spoilers) Yolbert Sánchez after Sánchez had walked and advanced to third on Nootbaar’s double. All in all, a good day for Rodríguez, who is batting .255 with a .683 OPS.

Sánchez also had a good day in one of his AFL cameo appearances, going 1-for-3 with a walk. That fifth-inning walk was his first time reaching base, and in the sixth, he mashed his first AFL tater, a two-run bomb that put the team up 8-4. He also made two errors at short that lead to two unearned runs scoring, but who among us has never made two errors that lead to two unearned runs scoring?

J.B. Olson got into the action as well on the mound side of things, entering with runners on first and second and two out. After allowing a ground-rule double to the first batter faced to score that inherited run, he induced a swinging strikeout and then pitched a clean fifth, two strikeouts total in the appearance and the all-important (W). Olson has allowed five earned runs in 9 ⅓ AFL innings.