• 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.

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• It’s hard to imagine Eloy Jimenez will be facing Triple-A pitching for too much longer. After a 2-HR performance on Friday, the 21-year-old is hitting .351/.400/.622 in 20 games since being promoted to the level, and has shown no signs of being slowed by the left adductor strain that sidelined him at the beginning of the month. Jimenez’s presence is one of if not the most obvious reasons the second half of 2018 is compelling despite the White Sox standing, as a solid two or so months of a lineup featuring him, Yoan Moncada, and Tim Anderson will offer a further glimpse into the future.
• Speaking of exciting players who might soon be in Chicago, Michael Kopech has put together two really good starts in a row, which is something we haven’t been able to say much this season. The 20 strikeouts in 12 innings across two starts is cool, but nothing new. What is new is that he only walked one batter a piece in those two outings, which is certainly a good sign for a pitcher whose struggled with command throughout the season. Kopech’s struggles certainly gives credence to those who think he’s more late-inning reliever than ace-level starting pitcher long term, but we’re a long way from that becoming a reality. It would be surprising if he doesn’t get his first crack at facing a major league lineup at some point before this summer ends.
• While BP’s Midseason Top 50 doesn’t include this year’s draft class, first-round pick Nick Madrigal was ranked No. 33 on Baseball America’s Midseason Top 100, and he was the White Sox third highest ranked behind Jimenez and Kopech. Since joining the organization, Madrigal has been to the plate 36 times between the AZL and Low-A Kannapolis and he’s reached base 17 times. He’s walked twice, been hit by a pitch four times, and has struck out zero times. That Madrigal has found immediate success as a polished college bat at the lowest levels of the minor leagues isn’t exactly surprising, but him doing exactly as expected is certainly better than the alternative.
• James Fegan of The Athletic profiled minor league reliever Ian Hamilton, whose success this season has him knocking at the door of a major league opportunity. Hamilton dominated Double-A during the first two months of the season and has put up zeros across all but one of his 11 appearances since being promoted to Triple-A Charlotte last month. Hamilton was an 11th round pick after spending his senior season at Washington State as a closer, so his trajectory as a reliever has never been in question. But him ascending to the majors for the White Sox would be a solid developmental win.
• Dylan Cease has been the biggest bright spot among White Sox prospects this season. The 22-year-old has pitched to somewhat mixed results in his four starts since promotion to Double-A, but has at the very least showed the type of swing-and-miss stuff that’s worth dreaming on. Perhaps more importantly, Cease has stayed healthy throughout the season, and after his last start sits at 93 1/3 innings on the season, which is tied for a career high with another month and a half or so left in the minor league season.
• Not that this would necessarily be considered a “success,” but the White Sox finally made the move to put Carson Fulmer in the bullpen after the 24-year-old’s struggles continued even after his demotion to Triple-A. It’s a disappointing but not unexpected outcome for the 2015 first rounder, and while it’s far from a guarantee, the hope is that he can reinvent himself as a reliever to still be a reliable part of the next White Sox contender. He’s made five appearances since the transition, giving up a pair of runs in one of them but zeros otherwise. He’s walked three and struck out five in 6 1/3 innings of work. That’s very much a “scouting the stat line” report, but it will be interesting to see what’s said about Fulmer once scouts get a look at how his stuff plays out of the bullpen.

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Gordon Beckham hit absolutely everywhere he played for his whole life, including his first 400 major league plate appearances and then he couldn’t hit. This stuff is really, really hard to get right.

But the White Sox have given themselves about as good of a shot of landing a quality pro as they could have last night in selecting Madrigal.  As you’ve likely read by now, the 5-foot-7 middle infielder has superb bat control and contact skills.  He also gets high marks for his speed, instincts, and work ethic.  The knocks are his size, potentially limited power, and a middling throwing arm.  Beyond that profile, here are the general factors working in his favor:

• Long track record.  As we’ve discussed with, say, Alec Hansen a few years ago and countless others — Brice Turang went from a 1-1 candidate to 21st overall this year, Brady Singer slid to the teens, Kumar Rocker is still on the draft board, etc.  Draft boards are incredibly volatile, and guys can crater from the top five to the fourth round based on a few bad months.  After all a full college season will net a player approximately 200-250 PAs. We’ve seen Giancarlo Stanton of all people have bad half seasons.  Players slump, play through injuries, and so on.  That’s not to say scouts don’t do a really good job of figuring out how a player projects regardless of whether some grounders find holes or gloves in a small sample, but if the draft happened in February or October you’d probably get wildly different outcomes.  This brings us back to Madrigal: Madrigal’s performed consistently for years now.  As a freshman in the Pac 12 he hit .333/.380/.456 and improved in each column of the triple slash line in his sophomore and junior seasons.
• Hit tool is hardest one to find.  Baseball fans, and White Sox fans in particular, have seen plenty of Big Power /Bad Contact prospects fail.  Joe Borchard was one of those. Courtney Hawkins a more recent vintage, just to name a few.  The thinking is obvious. A guy with huge raw power is tantalizing, and if you can improve his approach and cut down the swing and miss enough you can have a superstar on your hands.  Madrigal is certainly a different type of player, as his K% has fallen from 6.25 to 5.67 to 3.70 (!!) in his three years at Oregon State.  The guy has crazy bat-to-ball skills. Pair that with perfectly solid walk rates and you have a guy who projects to get on base and run well, which is a really stable floor for a guy to work from. Maybe he doesn’t have a plus-plus hit tool in pro ball, but there’s every reason to think he will based on the information we have now.
• Positional value.  You should always go best player available in the baseball draft.  You can never have enough pitching, and pitchers tend to be the only players who can really blitz through the minors in less than a year these days, and those guys are exceedingly rare — Chris Sale, Mike Leake, or various relievers come to mind.  And even the faster college bats like Kris Bryant took a year and a half to the majors.  Madrigal could very well do something similar, but we don’t know what the White Sox’ needs will be in two years, let alone three or four if there are any hiccups. That said, Madrigal might be able to stick at short and projects to be a plus defender at second base.  Yeah, that’s not an elite defensive catcher or Andrelton Simmons or anything, but again, it represents a higher floor than the Jake Burgers or Zack Collins picks who seem more likely than not to wind up at first.
• Bats are safer than arms.  A.J. Puk was the best college arm in 2016, he just got Tommy John.  He rated ahead of Cal Quantrill because Cal Quantrill was coming off Tommy John.  Matt Manning is a mystery box, with inconsistent velocity readings and command. Riley Pint has yet to post an ERA below 5.00 in pro ball. Braxton Garrett is out for the year with Tommy John. Jason Groome is getting Tommy John.  Ian Anderson is motoring along steadily if unremarkably, I suppose.  Those are the top seven arms who were drafted in 2016.  Some or all could still have good careers, but I think I’ve illustrated the point.
• He’s short.  Being short can mean a lack of power.  Our prospect team also ran an excellent feature on how to think about shorter players like Madrigal, particularly in light of the recent success of undersized hitters like Ozzie Albies, Jose Altuve, and Andrew Benintendi.  I will limit my thoughts as follows: If it’s basically the only knock on a player and he slides as a result, there can clearly be some value to be had there.  There’s a risk, I suppose, he’s Kevin Newman.  That said, Newman is hitting .313/.350/.391 in Triple-A and is still likely to be a major league contributor even if he’s not going to be a star.  Moreover, in the same conference, Newman slugged .421 with a .084 ISO in college compared to Madrigal’s .512 and .145 marks respectively. If Madrigal has even below average power, the rest of the profile can mean he’s a significant contributor and he slid to the White Sox are four simply because he’s 5-foot-7 instead of 5-foot-11.

In sum, I’d have been rooting for the White Sox to take Madrigal at two if they’d been selecting there, and regardless of how the pick works out I’m really pleased this is the direction they went.  Now all that’s left is the little detail of seeing how his pro career turns out.

Lead Image Credit: Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports

The 21-year-old Madrigal hit .406//.470/.586 in 133 at-bats as a junior with more walks (13) than strikeouts (5). Despite being listed at just 5-foot-7, he was considered by many scouts to be the best hitter in this draft. Whether he develops much power relative to his size is uncertain, but the consensus seems to be that he has a keen sense of the strike zone and superb bat-to-ball skills.

Madrigal is listed as both a second baseman and a shortstop, but where he ends up long-term is to be determined. There will be a lot of questions about how the White Sox infield situation will turn out with Madrigal in the fold and both Tim Anderson and Yoan Moncada going nowhere soon. But Nick Hostetler said recently that the White Sox were focused on best player available instead of positional fit, a completely logical stance given the unpredictability of how a roster is going to look three or four years down the road.

The pick, according to most projections, came down to Madrigal or Florida pitcher Brady Singer, and that wound up the case when the Phillies passed on Madrigal in favor of Wichita State’s Alec Bohm. As an advanced college bat, Madrigal is also seen as someone who could potentially move quickly through the system, but will likely head out to Arizona once Oregon State’s season comes to an end.

In the second round, the White Sox drafted Oklahoma University outfielder Steele Walker. Walker is a 5-foot-11 junior who hit .352/.441/.606 for the Sooners this season. A 21-year-old lefty, Walker’s carrying tool is his bat, as MLB.com says that’s his lone above-average skill and his glove will likely wind up in left, although he played both right and center in college. He performed well both with Team USA and in the wooden-bat Northwoods League in recent years.

While the White Sox may have merely been drafting strictly “best player available” on their board, as Hostetler indicated, in Madrigal and Walker they appear to have grabbed two of the more advanced college bats in the draft.

Lead Photo Credit: Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports