We opened Prospect Week talking about the White Sox prospects who hadn't quite reached a make-or-break point with their early returns. The next seven names have even less experience, as the White Sox just signed them in either their latest amateur draft or international classes.
Hagen Smith
Despite stated organizational preferences to take a position player with the No. 5 pick in the 2024 draft, when it came time for the rubber to meet the road, the White Sox couldn’t resist a pitcher with characteristics within their wheelhouse: a lefty with a power fastball/slider combination from a lower slot. Smith could probably run roughshod through the minors on the strength of his current one-two punch, but because his 2024 season with Arkansas was his first full season in his current form, because the 91⅔ innings he threw between college and Winston-Salem represented a career high, and because the White Sox don’t figure to have any immediate MLB ambitions, they have the intent on letting him acclimate to the five-day schedule and throw around 110 innings. In the event that minor league hitters fail to pose a challenge, the Sox will try to add some purpose to his work by working on a cutter as a third pitch, and perhaps a splitter to round it out.
Caleb Bonemer
As a Midwestern kid who starred for the White Sox Area Codes team, a Bonemer breakout would provide validation of a big tenet of the club's draft strategy. Bonemer is a necessary injection of right-handed pop into the Sox system, but questions about his ability to stick at short and the fluidity of his hit tool stand in front of any star projections. According to team officials, Bonemer showed well on both fronts in bridge league action and instructional league. Because there’s no short season leagues to provide real data, we can either take their word for it or be reflexively cynical, with nothing in between.
Blake Larson
If the White Sox made their fans feel safe enough to be confident in things, Larson would feel like the player development team running their best play. A funky and deceptive low slot lefty whose slider shape literally gets compared to Chris Sale is a framework the Sox have not just made work historically, but currently represents their best prospect, and making the most of Larson will involve a similar slow buildup. By the same token, the White Sox forking over seven figures to land an overslot prep arm after the first round might more readily conjure memories of Jared Kelley, Andrew Dalquist and Matthew Thompson. A good 2025 for Larson could finish out with a few dozen innings at Kannapolis, which would still be too far away for anyone to count their winnings.
Nick McLain
As an outfield ‘tweener who provided big collegiate offensive production in the Arizona desert, McLain will have to put numbers on the boards all the way up to keep questions about his long-term role at bay. But after hand injuries slowed him in college, as well as in his draft year, McLain didn’t make it into a professional game in 2024. The White Sox say he’s good to go for spring training and is already working out at the team complex, but he’s already ceded some of the head start his Arizona State polish should have afforded him.
Casey Saucke
Drafted a round after McLain, Saucke did appear in professional games after playing a full season for Virginia. In fact, the White Sox placed him in Winston-Salem, where he overcame a quiet start to hit .290/.333/.398 with a couple of homers, six walks and 26 strikeouts over his first 99 plate appearances as a pro. He was able to tap into his power in his junior season, setting a career high with 14 homers while reducing his strikeout rate a bit, and his results with the Dash were better than his previous wood-bat experiences on the Cape. Further fine-tuning of his plate discipline will be the task at hand.
PERTINENT: White Sox 2024 MLB Draft Day 2 recap
Sam Antonacci
Low-A baseball is not where you’d expect a low power, high OBP artist like Antonacci to meet his match after flummoxing similar talent levels across his productive collegiate career. Having Chase Meidroth and Rikuu Nishida further along in the system dampens the thrill in seeing an alternate version pass the initial tests. But Antonacci’s professional debut provided professional data, and his early Trackman results show the Sox got the rock bottom chase and swing-and-miss rates they ordered in a non-shortstop utilityman package.
PERTINENT: Caleb Bonemer and Sam Antonacci talk about proving themselves against top competition
Alejandro Cruz
While Cruz’s $2 million bonus makes him the headliner of the first White Sox international signing class announced under the leadership of David Keller, the agreement was struck during the days of Marco Paddy. The fact that he’s an 18-year-old Cuban makes him something of a transitional figure, given Keller has picked up the mantle of stressing the importance of a new facility in the Dominican. Unlike other Cubans signed by Paddy, it seems as though Cruz will start his career in the DSL, and given that he’ll be already on the older side of the competition, it’d help if he fit the billing right away, which is a third baseman with a decent idea of the strike zone and a simple swing that generates pull-field power.
