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White Sox Minor League Update: August 12, 2021

Yes, it’s late, we were ... unavoidably detained. But Jonathan Stiever and Chase Solesky threw nice starts!

By Julie Brady and Brett Ballantini
Chase Solesky couldn’t hurl the Dash to victory, but did his part over five innings.
Tiffany Wintz/South Side Sox

[Note: Apologies for the delay of this update. Estimable minors writer Julie Brady had this update nearly complete last night when her internet crapped out, necessitating a compilation assignment for me, which I wasn’t able to get to in the aftermath of all the Field of Dreams excitement. I’m also taking the rookie league games for the 12th, which will be obvious because that’s where the crappy writing begins.

The wifi for the divine Miss J has been resolved, so she is back on and ready to provide a timely update tonight.—Brett]

Jonathan Stiever pitched well and the Knights went 4-for-8 with runners in scoring position for the victory over hated rival the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp.

Neither of the runs allowed by Stiever were earned, and neither came on home runs, instead the product of an inning where the first two batters reached on errors (Gavin Sheets in right field, Matt Reynolds at shortstop). New addition Kyle Crick pitched two scoreless innings, striking out two; he has yet to allow a run for his new team over four appearances spanning five innings. He’s walked two and fanned five.

Hunter Schryver allowed multiple runs to score for the fifth time this season in 26 outings, sending his ERA north of four and WHIP beyond 1.500. Lane Ramsey struck out two in a perfect ninth, his first perfect inning since his promotion to the level (8 ⅓ innings total).

Ti’Quan Forbes opened up the scoring for the Knights in the third after Reynolds drew a leadoff walk by hitting his first Triple-A dinger, to left field. Another Reynolds leadoff walk in the fifth, followed by Forbes also drawing a free pass, led to two runs scoring when Blake Rutherford hit his 22nd double of the year. Yermín Mercedes followed it up with a single to score Rutherford.

The Knights added three more ultimately unnecessary runs in the eighth first with back-to-back doubles by Sheets and Mikie Mahtook, then Micker Adolfo singling in his seventh RBI with the team and first since July 25. Adolfo eventually scored on a Forbes sacrifice fly.

Poll

Charlotte doubled up the hated rival Jumbo Shrimp on Thursday, 8-4. Who was the Knights MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 3%
    Blake Rutherford: 2-for-5, 2 RBI, 2 2B
    (1 vote)
  • 0%
    Matt Reynolds: 0-for-1, 2 R, 3 BB, LOB, E
    (0 votes)
  • 33%
    Ti’quan Forbes: 1-for-2, 2 R, HR, 3 RBI, BB, SF, LOB
    (10 votes)
  • 16%
    Gavin Sheets: 2-for-4, R, 2B, K, LOB, E
    (5 votes)
  • 0%
    Kyle Crick: 2 IP, H, 2 K, 19 pitches/12 strikes, HOLD
    (0 votes)
  • 0%
    Lane Ramsey: IP, 2 K, 9 pitches/7 strikes
    (0 votes)
  • 46%
    Jonathan Stiever: 5 IP, 2 H, 2 R/0 ER, BB, 3 K, WIN
    (14 votes)
30 votes total Vote Now

Poll

Charlotte doubled up the hated rival Jumbo Shrimp on Thursday, 8-4. Who was the Knights Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 23%
    Hunter Schryver: IP, 2 H, 2 ER, BB, 2 K
    (5 votes)
  • 19%
    Laz Rivera: 0-for-5, 2 K, 2 LOB
    (4 votes)
  • 57%
    Deivy Grullón: 0-for-4, 3 K, 3 LOB, 0-for-1 CS
    (12 votes)
21 votes total Vote Now

Jason Bilous was on the losing end of the Bilous-Curlis matchup today (Connor Curlis, Chattanooga Lookouts starting pitcher, of course). Bilous falls to 2-6 with the Barons; while he’s struggled results-wise since his promotion shortly into the season, there’s definitely still promise. He’s only 23, and his BB/9 rate over 47 Birmingham innings entering this start was 3.3, a huge improvement over the 5.2 BB/9 he put up in 104 ⅔ innings with the Cannon Ballers in 2019. He’s also maintaining an 11.1 K/9.

The rest of the pitching was excellent, if too late; Félix Paulino and Zach Muckenhirn combined for 5 ⅔ scoreless innings, with four hits, no walks, and three strikeouts. Muckenhirn, a 26-year-old lefty, has a 1.45 ERA over 31 innings with a 1.228 WHIP.

A rehabbing Yasmani Grandal anchored the lineup from the 3-spot, going walkless but at least picking up a single in one official at-bat. He also provided the Barons with their first of three runs scored, a sacrifice fly to score Ian Dawkins in the third. Grandal caught five innings before being removed, a common practice in early rehab assignments.

Tyler Neslony continues to produce, singling in a run in the fourth; since his acquisition by the Sox in mid-July, he was only batting .407/.500/.797 entering Thursday’s game. Carlos Pérez, relegated to DH while Grandal is around, went 0-for-5 but capped off scoring with a bottom-of-the-ninth ground out.

Romy González went 2-for-3; he is hitless in four of nine games in August and has multi-hit games in the other five. He also played second base, notable because he’s been mixing in third base as well recently instead of his usual shortstop.

Poll

The Barons lost to Chattanooga on Thursday. Who was Birmingham’s MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 20%
    Romy González: 2-for-3, R, 2 BB, E
    (6 votes)
  • 40%
    Yasmani Grandal: 1-for-1, RBI, SF, caught five uninjured innings
    (12 votes)
  • 6%
    Jameson Fisher: 2-for-4, K, 2 LOB
    (2 votes)
  • 10%
    Tyler Neslony: 2-for-3, RBI, BB, K
    (3 votes)
  • 23%
    Félix Paulino: 3 2⁄3 innings, H, 2 K
    (7 votes)
  • 0%
    Zach Muckenhirn: 2 IP, 3 H, K
    (0 votes)
30 votes total Vote Now

Poll

The Barons lost to Chattanooga on Thursday. Who was Birmingham’s Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 90%
    Jason Bilous: 3 1⁄3 IP, 7 H, 7 R/6 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, HR
    (19 votes)
  • 0%
    Yolbert Sánchez: 0-for-4, K, SAC, 5 LOB
    (0 votes)
  • 4%
    Ian Dawkins: 0-for-4, R, 5 LOB
    (1 vote)
  • 0%
    Carlos Pérez: 0-for-5, RBI, 4 LOB
    (0 votes)
  • 4%
    Lenyn Sosa: 1-for-5, R, K, 4 LOB
    (1 vote)
21 votes total Vote Now

Chase Solesky is now the only current member of the Winston-Salem Dash pitching staff who has a start of more than four innings to his name this season, although the five sharp he threw today weren’t enough to earn him the win. This was his second start for the Dash and he immediately impressed by walking zero, striking out five; one of the two runs he allowed was unearned, as Lázaro Leal made an error at first base in the fifth. The other run came on a solo home run in the fourth.

Trey Jeans and Cooper Bradford, neither of whom have been good this year, were not good, and combined to walk five and give up three runs over three innings. Brian Glowicki came in and pitched a futile, scoreless ninth, striking out two and increasing his K/9 to 16.3 in 26 innings.

Dash bats were fairly quiet today, the loudest of them Yoelquis Céspedes’s two-run blast in the eighth inning, his seventh of the year; he also drew a walk to improve his overall line to .283/.360/.500 in 42 games. Luis Mieses continues to be on a doubles tear, hitting his seventh over the last 11 games. He is 14-for-42 since being re-promoted from Kannapolis. José Rodríguez continues to adjust well to his new level, his 1-for-4 today making him 4-for-13 with the Dash with six RBI (four of those coming on yesterday’s grand slam).

Poll

The Dash lost to Greensboro on Thursday. Who was Winston-Salem’s MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 0%
    Jagger Rusconi: 1-for-3, 3B, 2 R, K
    (0 votes)
  • 41%
    Yoelquis Céspedes: 1-for-3, R, HR, 2 RBI, BB, K, LOB, GIDP
    (15 votes)
  • 2%
    Luis Mieses: 1-for-4, 2B, R, LF assist at home plate
    (1 vote)
  • 52%
    Chase Solesky: 5 IP, 5 H, 2 R/1 ER, 7 K, HR
    (19 votes)
  • 2%
    Brian Glowicki: IP, 2 K
    (1 vote)
36 votes total Vote Now

Poll

The Dash lost to Greensboro on Thursday. Who was Winston-Salem’s Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 64%
    Alex Destino: 0-for-4, 2 K, LOB
    (11 votes)
  • 0%
    Luis Curbelo: 0-for-4, K
    (0 votes)
  • 0%
    Samir Dueñez: 0-for-3, BB, 2 K, LOB
    (0 votes)
  • 11%
    Evan Skoug: 0-for-3, 3 LOB, PB, 1-for-1 CS
    (2 votes)
  • 23%
    Cooper Bradford: 2 IP, 2 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 3 K
    (4 votes)
17 votes total Vote Now

This one got weird, as lower-level minor league games so often do. The only Cannon Ballers hit through the first eight innings was Harvin Mendoza’s single to lead off the second inning. James Beard, Jeremiah Burks, and Mendoza again were their only baserunners until the ninth, all three reaching on walks.

The ninth opened with the team trailing 6-0, and went like this: Samil Polanco walked. Bryan Ramos was hit by a pitch. Mendoza’s ground out advanced them both. The newly-promoted Misael González hit a sacrifice fly to make it 6-1. Chase Krogman walked and a wild pitch put Mendoza and Krogman on third and second. Wilber Sánchez drew the third three pass of the frame, and with the bases loaded, Daniel Millwee was hit by a pitch to make it 6-2. Then Burks came up, bases still loaded, and provided the inning’s lone hit, a single that scored two runs. That was all they could come up with, though, and Beard was called out looking on a full count to end the game.

It was Angel Acevedo with the start and the loss, one of his six runs unearned thanks to González’s first Low-A error in right field. The others, including a home run given up to the first batter in the bottom of the first, were unfortunately all his. Karan Patel put up one of his better outings in relief, striking out six and allowing four hits over 2 ⅔ innings, and Fraser Ellard was most effective in his Kannapolis debut, two scoreless innings with three strikeouts. Drafted in the eighth round this July, Ellard spent three games with the ACL Sox before joining the Ballers.

Poll

The Cannon Ballers lost to Augusta on Thursday. Who the Kannapolis MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 22%
    Jeremiah Burks: 1-for-3, 2 RBI, BB, K
    (4 votes)
  • 0%
    Harvin Mendoza: 1-for-3, R, BB, 2 LOB
    (0 votes)
  • 50%
    Karan Patel: 2 2⁄3 IP, 4 H, 6 K
    (9 votes)
  • 27%
    Fraser Ellard: 2 IP, BB, 3 K in Low-A debut
    (5 votes)
18 votes total Vote Now

Poll

The Cannon Ballers lost to Augusta on Thursday. Who the Kannapolis Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 81%
    Angel Acevedo: 3 1⁄3 IP, 5 H, 6 R/5 ER, 3 BB, 3 K, HR, LOSS
    (13 votes)
  • 18%
    James Beard: 0-for-4, BB, 3 K, 3 LOB
    (3 votes)
  • 0%
    Bryan Ramos: 0-for-3, 2 K
    (0 votes)
  • 0%
    Misael González: 0-for-3, RBI, SF, 3 K, 2 LOB, E
    (0 votes)
16 votes total Vote Now

A five-spot in first bats didn’t turn out to be all the White Sox needed in Arizona on Thursday, but the pen was just good enough to hold on for a 9-8 win. No bones about it, Garrett Schoenle was the only pitcher of note, and he saved this win by coming on after two run-scoring wild pitches from Erick Bello, and through the magic of the shoddy-bookkeeping ACL, threw one pitch for a line out double play to extinguish the baby Guardians.

Maybe we talk about the hitting, instead, like Colson Montgomery’s two-hit day (a double for one, but also a CS after a single) or Shawn Goosenberg three runs scored. How about Wilton Veras, with three hits/two doubles? We will definitely not talk about Wes Kath’s worst game as a pro, for which he was gifted a platinum sombrero.

Poll

The ACL White Sox held on to beat Cleveland on Thursday. Who the rookie MVP?

This poll is closed

  • 28%
    Colson Montgomery: 2-for-4, R, K, 2B, CS
    (6 votes)
  • 4%
    Shawn Goosenberg: 1-for-2, 3 R, K, 2 E
    (1 vote)
  • 61%
    Wilfred Veras: 3-for-4, 2 R, 2 2B, SB, RBI, LOB
    (13 votes)
  • 4%
    Ruben Benavides: 1-for-3, 2B, 3 RBI, K, 3 LOB
    (1 vote)
  • 0%
    Garrett Schoenle: 2⁄3 IP, one-batter SAVE
    (0 votes)
21 votes total Vote Now

Poll

The ACL White Sox held on to beat Cleveland on Thursday. Who the rookie Cold Cat?

This poll is closed

  • 71%
    Wes Kath: 0-for-4, 4 K, 2 LOB
    (15 votes)
  • 23%
    Cristian Mena: 4 IP, 8 H, 4 R/3 ER, 4 K
    (5 votes)
  • 4%
    Erick Bello: 1⁄3 IP, 2 H, 2 ER, BB, HOLD
    (1 vote)
21 votes total Vote Now

In the DSL, the White Sox were supposed to host the Blue Jays. However, that game, and all games, were cancelled. Let’s presume rain, but who knows? However, the games are going to be made up as doubleheaders on Friday, so may god have mercy on Julie’s soul — or mine — with the slate of games for August 13.

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