White Sox Minor League Player of the Week (August 8-14, 2022): Oscar Colás

We’re going to start running the weekly update a little differently, with a single winner named and spotlighted first, then the rest of the affiliate MVPs following, in order.

And on that note, let’s make it super weird and say that even before I get to Oscar Colás, let’s point out how good José Rodríguez has been in August. The power is back this month, with six homers in just 12 games. He has more homers than singles, and the same amount of doubles as singles, too. He is almost at a 100 wRC+ for the season and that .431 ISO he has this month is certainly helping get it there sooner.

Now, to the MVP of the week: Oscar Colás.

Colás has been fantastic in Double-A. So much so that it does seem like more and more fans want him to see MLB this season. I am not sure if he can save the season for the White Sox, but he is showing a lot of pop right now. He has a .341 ISO in 22 games, which is beyond amazing. How is he doing this? Well, he is making really good contact. A third of his batted balls are line drives, and more than 50% of his batted balls are pulled. He is just hitting them in a sweet spot. The concern might be that the fly balls are not plentiful. A 60% HR/FB rate is high, a number I don’t think I have seen. Maybe Colás runs into trouble against better pitching and eventually doesn’t have an ISO of better than .300. He is not on track for that crash right now, though.

Birmingham Barons

José Rodríguez: .296/.367/.741 — 3 HR, 2 BB, 6 K, 7 R, 4 RBI, 1 SB
Yoelqui Céspedes: .136/.174/.227 — 0 BB, 10 K
Oscar Colás: .391/.481/.783 — 3 HR, 3 BB, 9 K, 5 R, 5 RBI **Weekly MVP**
Sean Burke: 5 IP, 0.00 ERA, 1 BB, 5 K
Matthew Thompson: 7 ¹⁄₃ IP, 4.91 ERA, 3 BB, 7 K
Caleb Freeman: 2 IP, 0.00 ERA, 0 BB, 0 K

and now, here are the rest of this week’s MVPs!

Charlotte Knights

Romy González: .150/.150/.350 — 1 HR, 0 BB, 8 K, 3 R, 1 RBI
Tyler Neslony: .389/.389/.444 — 0 BB, 4 K, 5 RBI, 1 SB **Weekly MVP**
Yolbert Sánchez: .333/.333/.333 — 0 BB, 3 K, 3 R, 2 SB
Jake Burger: .286/.400/.286 — 4 BB, 5 K, 1 R, 2 RBI
Jason Bilous: 4 IP, 2.25 ERA, 3 BB, 5 K
Kade McClure: 2 IP, 0.00 ERA, 1 BB, 3 K

Tyler Neslony finally made it to Triple-A in July, but struggled for quite a while. Really, he was having a rough go of it until this week. It was a singles-heavy week with no walks, but he did show some timely hitting, with five RBIs. He still just has a 36 wRC+, so you can see how tough his first stint in Triple-A has been. The issues have stemmed a bit from a 9% increase in strikeouts and 3.6% decrease in walks. He just is not as comfortable at the plate right now compared to his time in Birmingham earlier this year. This week changed some of that, but he didn’t walk to it; it was all about contact. Neslony needs to go back to being a line-drive hitter, the type of guy he was in Double-A. The best way to do that is to increase his pull rate, which will mean he is getting harder contact.

Winston-Salem Dash

Bryan Ramos: .412/.500/.765 — 1 HR, 3 BB, 0 K, 5 R, 5 RBI, 1 SB
Colson Montgomery: .462/.563/.846 — 1 HR, 3 BB, 2 K, 4 R, 2 RBI **Weekly MVP**
Luis Míeses: .250/.269/.417 — 1 HR, 0 BB, 1 K, 3 R, 3 RBI
Duke Ellis: .115/.179/.154 — 1 BB, 5 K, 4 R, 1 SB
Norge Vera: 2 IP, 0.00 ERA, 0 BB, 2 K
Drew Dalquist: 4 ²⁄₃ IP, 13.50 ERA, 4 BB, 6 K
Cristian Mena: 2 ²⁄₃ IP, 3.37 ERA, 2 BB, 7 K

It was a tough choice this week in Winston-Salem between Bryan Ramos and Colson Montgomery, but the wRC+ of Montgomery won out. Still, these are the top two prospects on the team, and they are performing like it.

Montgomery was still getting on base during his slump, as he just wasn’t making great contact. That changed last week with a .462 average. He hit for more power, including his fifth homer in High-A. With one more homer, he will have 10 on the season. Power is the one thing we want to see be more consistent from Montgomery and last week was a promising sign, with a good rate. Overall, Montgomery still is walking (24) more than striking out (22) for the Dash, which is just remarkable over 33 games. He is still just a High-A shortstop and that should probably be the case the rest of this year — I do not think he will get a second promotion in his first full season of professional baseball. However, it will be interesting to see if he gets time at third base next season, to help figure out where he should fit on the diamond. The bat plays, so he needs to stick somewhere.

Kannapolis Cannon Ballers

Wes Kath: .313/.476/.563 — 1 HR, 5 BB, 5 K, 4 R, 3 RBI **Weekly MVP**
Wilfred Veras: .292/.292/.542 — 1 HR, 0 BB, 4 K, 4 R, 5 RBI
Jordan Sprinkle: .000/.111/.000 — 0 BB, 2 K (4th round pick, $452,900 bonus)
Jacob Burke: .200/.274/.200 — 0 BB, 0 K, 2 R, 2 RBI (11th round pick, $225,000 bonus)
Jared Kelley: 4 ²⁄₃ IP, 1.93 ERA, 5 BB, 4 K
Kohl Simas: 4 ¹⁄₃ IP, 4.15 ERA, 6 BB, 3 K

Wes Kath’s overall production has been quite average. He has a 106 wRC+ and has pretty much been around that number after the first few weeks of the season. On the good side, he walks a lot — a 13.4% walk rate is very healthy. The power could be better, but most of that is just 18 doubles. Eleven homers is a good number, but a .146 ISO is low for what we should expect from Kath. The very bad with Kath is the strikeouts and the defense at third so far. He strikes out a third of the time. That is going to need to come down, especially with the ISO this low, for a supposed power bat. He has also really struggled in the field. There is not a breakdown on what kind of errors he has, but he did play right field in one game last year, so I assume his secondary positions are the corner outfield spots. It would be great if he could stick at third, but the bat and defense need to be better.

ACL White Sox

Drake Logan: .000/.250/.000 — 2 BB, 4 K (19th round pick, $125,000 bonus)
Dario Borrero: .364/.417/.455 — 1 BB, 1 K
Layant Tapia: .385/.500/.385 — 3 BB, 3 K, 3 R, 1 RBI, 1 SB **Weekly MVP**
Brooks Baldwin: .063/.167/.063 — 2 BB, 3 K, 1 R, 1 SB (12th round pick, $125,000 bonus)
Yohemy Nolasco: 3 IP, 12.00 ERA, 1 BB, 2 K
Ethan Hammerberg: 2 IP, 0.00 ERA, 1 BB, 3 K (20th round pick, $100,000 bonus)
Billy Seidl: 1 IP, 0.00 ERA, 0 BB, 1 K (15th round pick, $100,000 bonus)
Shane Murphy: 1 IP, 0.00 ERA, 1 BB, 0 K (14th round pick, $125,000 bonus)

DSL White Sox

Erick Hernández: .111/.273/.222 — 2 BB, 1 K, 2 R
Loidel Chapelli Jr.: .500/.500/.625 — 0 BB, 1 K, 2 R, 4 RBI, 1 SB **Weekly MVP**
Guillermo Rodríguez: .273/.273/.273 — 0 BB, 3 K, 2 R, 1 RBI
Ryan Burrowes: .214/.267/.214 — 1 BB, 4 K, 5 R
Marcelo Valladares: (Did not pitch last week)