• Ian Hamilton is the most exciting of this group.  Acquired 10 rounds later than Burdi in the 2016 draft, Hamilton’s progress has gone virtually as well one could possibly imagine.  He boasts a fastball touching triple-digits and pairs it with a vicious low-90s slider.  In the two years since he was drafted, Hamilton has used that arsenal to emphatically suplex minor league hitters into the dumpster.  2018 saw him throw 51 2/3 innings across Double-A and Triple-A wherein he posted an ERA of 1.74 with 52 strikeouts against only 8 walks and one home run.  It took major league batters to finally challenge him, as he did give up two homers in Chicago in only eight innings, and his strikeout rate was middling in that brief audition.  Hamilton had mentioned his slider occasionally not behaving the way he wanted it to, but there’ are plenty of reasons to pencil him into the high-leverage portion of the 2019 bullpen right out of the gate and to expect him to thrive.  One negative corollary here is that an 11th round pick basically did what you wanted your first rounder to do.  Second, it shows that even when a relief prospect hits his 80th or 90th percentile outcome (at least so far), it doesn’t really change the organization’s overall outlook.  That said, finding stud relievers after even the second round is a huge bonus, and as we can see in Milwaukee, if the starting pitching is even OK, you can get a lot done with a plus bullpen.
• Ryan Burr must be named alongside Hamilton, but his timetable has basically matched his flashier 18th century counterpart.  Like Hamilton, Burr was acquired relatively cheaply in a trade for international free agent pool money sent off to Arizona.  He doesn’t throw as hard as Hamilton, and his results were not nearly as shiny at pretty much any level.  He also changed his pitching style to work more up in the zone at the White Sox’s request, and had an adjustment period before breezing through Charlotte to make his debut at the end of the 2018 season.  Renteria used him sparingly once he arrived on the South Side, and he certainly had a rocky time of it in his first look at the majors.  He may not be the closer/elite-eighth inning fireman type Hamilton and/or Burdi look like they should be, but the White Sox got him essentially for free and can just plop him into the heart of what is looking like a really strong home-grown bullpen.
• Caleb Frare is one of an increasingly large fraternity of pitchers: relief prospects the Yankees found out of nowhere who they have to get rid of because they have too many to protect on their 40-man.  The Yankees got Frare out of Custer County High School in Montana in the 11th round of the 2012 draft. Throwing in the mid-90s from the left side with a nice slider, Frare also got a brief look at the majors in September.  While he slots in behind Jace Fry as the best lefty in the bullpen, Frare should also break camp with the major league team barring another Jake Peter-for-Joakim Soria-and-Luis Avilan style trade over the winter.  Between Jace Fry, Frare, and Aaron Bummer, the White Sox now have three lefties who look like credible assets and … well are you noticing the trend here? Frare was acquired for IFA money the White Sox couldn’t use and he may be part of a really strong bullpen as soon as 2019.

Given how shaky the position player group has looked and how downright terrifying the starting pitching situation is, it really isn’t hard to see that 2018 saw the tip of a potential flood of really strong relievers who may be an organizational strength over the coming years. This trio rates highly among them.

• Dylan Cease continues to add to his breakout 2018 season, as he has now thrown 40.2 dominant innings in Double-A after coming into the year having never pitched above Low-A.  Although Cease had some things in common with Kopech–elite fastball velocity, potentially wipeout breaking pitch–Cease’s issue had been staying healthy and on the mound more than Kopech’s bugbears of command and control.  That’s not to say Cease is Greg Maddux, exactly, but he does not boast Kopech’s musclebound build and had never thrown more than 93.33 innings in a pro season before this year.  On the other hand, he hasn’t gone totally walk crazy the way Kopech has from time to time either.  He’s now up to 112.33 innings in 2018 and judging from his stat line he’s showing no signs of fatigue.  Indeed, his last three starts have been triumphs, combining to 19 shut out innings with 28 strikeouts and only three walks.  One suspects he’ll start 2019 in Double-A again, but this is what he needed to do to make up for his time lost to injury and has thoroughly revived his chances to actually stick as a starting pitcher.
• The Winston-Salem Dash of High-A have lost Micker Adolfo to injury and Luis Alexander Basabe to promotion, and their lineup is still loaded with talent.  Blake Rutherford continues his bounce-back 2018 campaign, continuing to hit for contact and improving his power numbers with a .305/.352/.450 line.  On Tuesday, Luis Robert returned from his most recent injury and went two-for-four.  He joins Rutherford and Luis Gonzalez, the 2017 third-rounder who is posting an identical .850 OPS in High-A as he had in Low-A while working with Aaron Rowand to try to stick in center field.  From the outfield, all three can look in to see Nick Madrigal on the dirt who, unsurprisingly, has been a fast mover.  After 19 pro games, Madrigal finally had his first strikeout, but he has hit for average and gotten on base as advertised.  If they play well down the stretch, all four of these are candidates to start 2019 in Double-A.
• Ian Hamilton and Ryan Burr have been reunited at Triple-A Charlotte, as Burr has  joined his brother in history puns.  While the Mets have devoted a lot of resources without a lot of results to replenishing their organizational right-handed relief depth–this was essentially their only return for their sell-off last trade deadline, for example–the White Sox may have found a brace of setup men or even closers via trading international pool money (Burr) and the use of an 11th round pick (Hamilton).  Burr hasn’t skipped a beat in his first three innings in Charlotte, as he has yet to allow a run, and Hamilton keeps cruising along with an ERA in the low 2.00s and peripherals to match.  As fun as it is to see Matt Davidson’s surprising success in his relief outings, it seems likely these two will arrive sooner rather than later and take up some of the innings that have gone to lesser talents of late.

Lead Image Credit:  Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports