The most astonishing thing about David Holmberg is that he’s somehow only 25 years old. This is a guy traded by the White Sox to Arizona back in 2010 along with Daniel Hudson for Edwin Jackson before bouncing around multiple organizations and ultimately ending up back in Chicago. Holmberg is one of the rare high school players drafted by the Sox to actually make it to the majors. He was once even thought of highly enough to be the Diamondbacks sixth best prospect back in 2013 but every time one of his parent clubs called him up, he disappointed. 2017 saw more of the same, but with slight improvements.

Holmberg isn’t quite talented enough to be anything more than a swingman and to their credit, the Sox seem to know this using him as a starter seven times this summer and 30 times as a reliever. Like just about every sinkerball pitcher ever not named Brandon Webb, Holmberg does not strike hitters out (5.2 K/9) which is fine enough when his command is on. Unfortunately, his command isn’t on terribly often and he walked more hitters than he managed to punch out. A season of just below replacement level represents marked improvement for Holmberg and there might be a place in the bullpen for him to start the 2018 season, but there are enough interesting young arms coming down the pipeline that Holmberg might be looking for work again soon enough.

Gregory Infante was another delightful case of the 2017 bullpen becoming a late 2000s Birmingham Barons class reunion. Infante had last pitched in the majors in 2010 for … the White Sox. After spending the last half decade bouncing around various minor league cities, he came to Spring Training on a minor league deal and managed to finally put it together. Strikeouts have never been a problem for Infante, and in general they never should be for someone whose fastball comfortably sits in the upper 90s. But in the last seven years, he only managed to have a BB/9 below 4 once until this year’s 3.3. Was it magic or smoke and mirrors that finally resulted in the turn around? Who knows! His peripherals suggest this mini-breakout should be repeatable enough and if not, hey, he’s at least another fun mildly successful flamethrowing Don Cooper scrapheap revival project.

Of all the players I had expected to be shipped out for prospects before the 2017 season came to a close, Nate Jones is the only one still with the White Sox and not for happy reasons. Back on Valentine’s Day, I wrote about how he could bring back a sneaky good return seeing as when healthy he’s been one of the American League’s premier yet unappreciated setup guys. His April was consistent with what we’d grown used to from him: vicious strikeouts on dominating heat and impossible sliders presaged by a waggling ball held high in the heavens.

But his elbow would not allow such wonders to be viewed for long. His ulnar nerve acted up, sitting awkwardly post-2014 TJS and required surgical repositioning in mid-July. The good news is his UCL remained intact and undamaged. The bad news is he lost a year of his prime and will now be paid far less than he would before the surgery thanks to some interesting wording in his contract. Jones should return at some point next season, giving the Sox a bonafide closer or ace setup man that may be able to tempt a contending team into parting with prospects.

Rymer Liriano is sadly saddled with the Quad-A label. He’s still young enough, but doesn’t really do anything well enough to get over that hump. In an offseason full of grabbing any and every franchise’s troubled young hitter who fell victim to roster crunches, Liriano was yet another attempt at finding something worthwhile. He only managed a .740 OPS while playing right field for Charlotte, keeping him firmly at the end of the line for MLB at bats. When he finally made it to Chicago in September, he did not impress. No corner outfielder’s defense is good enough to make hitting .220/.304/.341 palatable and the influx of new corner outfielders in the system have likely spelled the end of the line for Liriano in Chicago.

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Putnam emerged as as a legitimate late inning bullpen piece for the White Sox in 2014 when threw 54 2/3 innings with a 1.98 ERA, and became a sinkerballing strikeout machine a year later when he posted a 11.8 K/9 in 48 2/3 innings. He’s failed to stay healthy, however, as he reportedly tried to pitch with a weak ligament that was discovered last year when he underwent surgery to remove bone chips. He’s thrown just 36 innings the last two seasons because of injuries.

“When they removed the chips, the ligament was not in great shape but Zach and his doctors thought it was worthwhile for him to try to fight back and pitch through it, which obviously he was able to do for a short period of time but ultimately the ligament gave out,” Hahn said. “Zach deserves a world of credit for doing everything he could the last two years to fight his way back to contribute in the bullpen. Unfortunately it didn’t work out for him.”

Putnam’s injury is devastating for a pitcher who bounced around early in his career before finally seeming to latch on with the White Sox. Originally drafted by the Indians, he bounced around from Cleveland to Colorado to the Cubs before sticking with the White Sox. The fact that he’s unlikely to be healthy enough to contribute again until he’s 31, and even that being far from a given because of the injury, is a frustrating development.

From the standpoint of the present and future White Sox, the bullpen came into the season as an expected strength with Putnam joining David Robertson and Nate Jones to form a dynamic late-inning trio. Despite two-thirds of that trio being derailed by injury, the bullpen has obviously been as good if not better than expected. Putnam would’ve been a likely trade candidate if healthy, and while this injury rids the Sox of that potential chip, the uncertainty that surrounds any bullpen arm, whether injury related or not, means his injury does little to affect the rebuild.

2. We knew coming out of the weekend that Carlos Rodon was back in Chicago and expected to rejoin the White Sox rotation this week. On Monday, we got a date as the left-hander will make his season debut Wednesday against the Yankees.

As Ryan Schultz wrote Monday, what Rodon brings the White Sox in the immediacy is innings for a depleted pitching staff. The rotation’s inability to pitch deep into ballgames has taxed a bullpen that has performed far beyond any reasonable expectations given the circumstances, and cracks in their armor were finally seen in Sunday’s loss to the Athletics. Even if the White Sox bring Rodon along slowly — he threw around 90 pitches in his each of his final three rehab starts — his presence will be welcomed relief for the, uh … relief.

More importantly, Rodon’s season debut offers another glimpse at what is hopefully another piece of the White Sox future. Given the patience the White Sox have shown with their plethora of prized prospects — not to mention those prospects’ respective struggles — there has been nary a sign of players expected to make up the core of the White Sox next contender thus far in 2017, save for Tim Anderson. Rodon’s injury was a setback as 2017 was supposed to be the year he turned the corner from potential front end starter to bonafide front end starter, but a solid and pain free final three months of the season will go a long way in offering more hope for the future.

3. As to whose place Rodon will take in the rotation, that is still unknown. The obvious candidate would be Monday’s starter, David Holmberg, who has filled in admirably during the last month despite playing a role in which he’s likely under-qualified.

Holmberg made six starts and never allowed more than three earned runs in any of them. The problem, of course, is that he couldn’t pitch deep into ballgames. Monday’s 5 1/3 inning outing against the Yankees was, in fact, his longest outing of the season and only the second in which he was able to complete five innings.

Still, he did about as well as one could ask given the circumstances. Whether he’s shipped back to Triple-A on Wednesday or kept around as a bullpen piece, he should be given credit for hanging around in a tough situation.

4. Ozzie Guillen was present Saturday for Mark Buehrle’s jersey retirement, and is usually the case at Ozzie Guillen-attended events, he was among the most quote-worthy people in the house.

One of the more interesting subjects he touched on, however, was Avisail Garcia. Guillen mentioned running into Garcia during the Venezuelan Winter League and speaking his mind to him, as Guillen is wont to do.

“I saw him batting seventh and I was all over him,” Guillen said. “I said ‘You should be embarrassed you’re batting seventh in winter league, you have to be third, or fourth. This is winter league.’ When you go to there and you play in the big leagues, it makes it easier. Now he’s picked it up. Hopefully he will keep it up. Hopefully he’ll keep it up and make some money. That’s what we want. Some cash. Take it home.”

Speaking of Garcia, he’s up to fifth in American League All-Star voting for outfielders, ahead of the likes of Mookie Betts and Jose Bautista and a little more than 300,000 votes behind third place George Springer.

I’m hesitant to get too “fanned up” for the White Sox in this space too often, but while the prospect of Garcia representing the White Sox at the All-Star Game is an insane reality I have already come to grips with, the idea of him winning the fan vote and being a starter is within reach. This is the world in which we’re living. Screw it. #VoteAvi.

5. James Fegan interviewed every White Sox pitcher about their first career strikeout for a piece over at The Athletic. It’s worth your time for callbacks to former Braves catcher Javy Lopez and a few guys not remembering all the details of their first strikeout as well as one would think. It’s worth your time.

That piece coupled with Mark Buehrle’s jersey retirement got me wondering who Buehrle’s first career strikeout was. The answer is Jose Hernandez of the Milwaukee Brewers, pitching in relief in the ninth inning of a game the White Sox won 11-5 on July 16, 2000.

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Their run differential following Wednesday’s 4-2 loss in Minnesota is now zero, which is somehow second best in their division, and their Third Order Winning Percentage entering the day was .495. Put simply, the White Sox performance to date is more in line with approximately a .500 team.

That difference also only equates to about three wins, so we’re not saying the White Sox have been unlucky to a substantial degree, but this illustrates by larger point. The White Sox are somehow playing better than their record despite their staring pitching performing like utter trash.

First, the season stats: Entering play Wednesday, White Sox starters have thrown the third fewest innings in the American League, ahead of just Minnesota and Baltimore. Their 4.85 ERA is ahead of only the aforementioned pair and Seattle. Their HR/9 is tied for third worst with Seattle, ahead of only Minnesota and the LA Angels. They’re striking out batters at the fourth worst rate in the league, and they’re walking batters at the second highest rate in the league.

Using an arbitrary end point, in 18 games since the calendar turned to June, the White Sox have had only one starter go seven innings and only five times have they gone six innings. Starters have only lasted as much as five innings in half of those 18 games.

You get the point.

We knew coming into the season that the White Sox pitching depth was thin. The fact that as we approach the halfway point, the only starters who started the season with the team and have yet to spend time on the disabled list are Jose Quintana and Derek Holland — and neither have been particularly good — means we’ve seen a whole lot of Dylan Covey, David Holmberg, and Mike Pelfrey, hardly a trio that elicits a whole lot of confidence. What’s funny is that those three more or less held their own, relative to expectations, but Holland, Quintana, and Miguel Gonzalez have all been underwhelming.

2. Really, it’s been a credit to the White Sox bullpen that the White Sox are merely the second worst team in the American League and not on par with, say, the Philadelphia Phillies. They currently sport the fourth best ERA in the American League and sixth best K/9.

This, of course, is not sustainable, and Rick Renteria is well aware.

“These guys are trying to give us length,” manager Rick Renteria said. “It just hasn’t happened. I get it. I don’t anticipate that’s what’s going to continue to happen as we move forward. I don’t think anybody could sustain over a long haul using your starters for three or four innings. It’s impossible. You would wear out your arms in the pen. Today we were fortunate in that we just used two guys for quite a few innings and outs. … They did a very nice job. That type of work is unsustainable.”

One of the crazier aspects of the White Sox bullpen’s stellar performance is that it hasn’t come from the guys you would’ve expected coming into the season. David Robertson has been better than last season, but Nate Jones and Zach Putnam have both been injured for most of the season, while Tommy Kahnle could be an All-Star and Anthony Swarzak has been lights out for long stretches of the season. Likewise, they’ve gotten competent innings out of the likes of Chris Beck, which I never would’ve imagined coming into the season.

3. We worried at the start of the season that the White Sox pitching depth issues would lead to premature promotions for any of the heralded prospects. That, uh, hasn’t been a problem.

So that’s now 32 IP, 36 H, 27 ER, 23 BB, 16 K, 6 HR and a 7.59 ERA over Carson Fulmer’s last 7 starts

— James Fegan (@JRFegan) June 21, 2017

Once the White Sox acquired Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez, Fulmer fell down the totem pole a bit in terms of pitching prospect upside, but the White Sox top arms taking longer than normal to look major league ready is at least worth keeping an eye on. The plus side of having no interest in winning is that their struggles simply mean they get more time at Triple-A to develop, while the downside is that, ya know, they’re struggling.

4. Tim Anderson committed his 16th error of the season in Wednesday’s loss, which is the highest total in baseball by any player at any position.

Errors don’t tell the whole story, of course, but FRAA has him at -2.1 on the season, which is 26th out of 35 qualified shortstops this season (although above bigger names like Jean Segura, Xander Bogaerts, and Brandon Crawford) and right in line with how they viewed him last year (he finished at -4.7 last year in a little more than half a season).

Anderson’s struggles are noticeable, but also given his athleticism and what we’ve seen from him when he’s at his best, they’re likely mental. I’d fathom a guess he’ll break out of his defensive funk sooner rather than later.

5. The White Sox announced the signing of first round pick Jake Burger on Wednesday to a signing bonus worth $3.7 million. They also reportedly came to terms with second round pick Gavin Sheets on an over-slot deal worth approximately $2 million.

They saved approximately $500K on signing Burger under-slot, and also reportedly got third round pick Luis Gonzalez to sign for $119K less than his slot, so some of those savings went to Sheets. It’s nice to see the White Sox avoid any type of draft pick signing drama, and all of their top picks should be reporting to short season ball soon enough.

For full coverage of White Sox draft pick signings, our friends at FutureSox are a great resource.

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Thursday’s start was vintage Holland. He jammed hitters with the fastball on the inner half of the plate to generate soft contact, while fooling hitters on a regular basis with the slider. Six of his seven punch outs were swinging, and three of those six came on sliders.

It’s obvious to say that when a pitcher’s command is shaky, his performance drops off, but Holland’s margin for error is slim, and Thursday he demonstrated, albeit against an underwhelming offense, just how effective he can be when his stuff is working.

He’s been an asset to the White Sox through the first month of the season, and if he’s able to demonstrate this kind of ability with some consistency, it’s not inconceivable that he could rebuild his value even more ahead of the trade deadline. We’re still several starts away from that happening, and injury or decline are still probably more likely, but the stuff is clearly still there.

2. Nate Jones was placed on the 10-day disabled list Thursday after experiencing minor nerve irritation, and reliever David Holmberg was called up to take his place on the roster. Elbow injuries are scary for any pitcher, and particularly so for Jones, who had Tommy John surgery in 2014. But the White Sox say they are confident it isn’t anything major after an MRI showed no major damage.

Jones’ 2016 season was sneakily great, and along with David Robertson entered the season as the White Sox reliever with the most trade value. Hopefully, this absence doesn’t hinder that too badly, but with Jones joining Zach Putnam and Jake Petricka on the DL, the the White Sox are fortunate in having the two greatest relievers in major league history emerge out of nowhere in Tommy Kahnle and Anthony “Backdraft” Swarzak, which should make these absences less cumbersome.

3. On the subject of injuries, Carlos Rodon was transferred to the 60-day DL in order to get Holmberg on the 40-man roster, a move Rick Hahn said was purely administrative because, by the time he’s ready to play it will be at least 60 days from when he was initially placed on the DL.

“Based upon the program we have laid out ahead of him, at this point, we don’t believe he’s going to be completed with all of his eventually rehab starts by June 1,” general manager Rick Hahn said. “So, from an administrative standpoint, it made sense to go ahead and transfer his DL placement from 10-day to 60-day DL. He continues to progress in Arizona. At this point we do not have a specific when we know he’ll begin a rehab assignment, but he’s getting closer to that.”

Rodon’s injury and the uncertainty that surrounded his status for so long has led to some anxious feelings. Getting to the point where a return date is actually known would be a step in the right direction, and while we aren’t quite to that point yet, things seem to at least be progressing.

4. Thursday’s game marked the end of a season-opening stretch where the White Sox played 24 of their first 27 games against American League Central teams, as they open a three-game set against the Baltimore Orioles on Friday. They went 14-10 in those 24 games, with the only outlier a three-game set in New York against the Yankees. The White Sox have been dreadful against AL Central teams in recent years, finishing below-.500 against those teams in each of the last four seasons. From 2013-16, the Sox went 123-181 against the AL Central, a .404 winning percentage, so it’s only fitting that the one year they’re not supposed to contend is the year that luck seems to be turning around.

There’s still a long way to go, but the White Sox have already played 31.5 percent of their AL Central schedule this season. And even if it doesn’t amount to much, seeing wins against the Indians, Tigers, and Royals is nothing if not gratifying.

5. Avisail Garcia went 2-for-5 with a pair of RBI in Thursday’s win, and his slash line is currently at .371/.419/.598. This has been your semi-regular “Avisail Garcia is still unfathomably hot” update of the week.

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