Catching up with the White Sox’s AFL position player prospects before fall ball

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- Had the White Sox stuck to the original timetable, seeing Caleb Bonemer listed as an outfielder for the Glendale Desert Dogs upon the release of Arizona Fall League rosters this week might have come as quite the surprise.

"I think originally that was the plan -- I wasn't going to play outfield in Birmingham, just the fall league," Bonemer told Sox Machine this past weekend.

As it played out, the White Sox tipped the position change -- or at least the position addition -- for Bonemer in late August. He made his center field debut for Birmingham on Aug. 26, and spent the remainder of the season rotating between the outfield, third base and DH.

Bonemer said he'd never played outfield before this season ("not even a single inning"), and quickly became introduced to the difficulties of navigating the warning track.

"The first two games out there, there were some pretty tough balls that, like, I mean, they could have been caught, but they're tough plays to make," Bonemer said. "I think now, having a few weeks under my belt, I think I probably would have had a better shot at catching them now."

He's getting acclimated to all the running, and figuring out his range for calling off teammates, but credited experienced outfielders Samuel Zavala, Jacob Burke and Dylan Campbell with having confidence about what they can get to. Now he'll take the project to Glendale, with less familiar teammates and the high skies of the Arizona Fall League.

The White Sox were able to add expanded defensive responsibilities to Bonemer's plate because the bat is in a pretty good place. His 595 plate appearances in 2026 were evenly divided between Winston-Salem and Birmingham, at least in a rough cut sense, and he was able to get on top of the strikeout problem that had nagged him at High-A and wrestle it downward one level up:

Bonemer said he left room to improve with the hit tool and his average, but felt like he made productive adjustments to navigate the transition from Winston-Salem to Birmingham. After weathering a major league percentage of sliders and a disproportionate amount of HBPs early, Bonemer said he feels the pitch mixes he's seeing are closer to neutral, and what had been a simple scouting report has turned into more of a "cat and mouse game."

Lifting and pulling remains the core part of Bonemer's offensive identity, but he said he was able to find productive contact points for opposite-field success this year, which allowed him to pick his spots to jump on fastballs and cover a wider band of velocities.

"I think that's just a testament -- the oppo homers -- to just being stronger, just kind of being able to get the heater a little bit deeper, kind of allows me to still get the breaking ball a little bit," Bonemer said.

"I still honestly pull quite a few balls now, because that's that's kind of my game is just, like, heavy pull-side. I think the main thing is just being able to have the ability to, if I'm late on a heater, being able to shoot it the other way instead of just always having to try to cheat to it and get it out front."

The simpler testament to the 20-year-old's added strength is the 37 homers, after hitting just 10 over 96 games in his first full season in 2025. What would Bonemer have thought if you told him before the season that he'd be approaching 40 homers at the end of it?

"I'd probably be pretty stoked," Bonemer said. "Honestly, I didn't expect to hit this many. Going into the offseason, my goal was to kind of get bigger and stronger and increase my homers, but I mean, yeah, 37 right now, that's honestly a lot more than I expected. It's been a great year."

Were Anthony DePino not also headed to the Arizona Fall League, he would have ended his season on the injured list due to a concussion he suffered in a collision at first base at Biloxi.

As it stands, the IL stint serves as an inadvertent break in between 125 regular-season games -- the first 32 at Winston-Salem, the rest with Birmingham -- and fall ball.

While Bonemer anticipated a spot on the Glendale roster, DePino said he aimed to play his way into the mix, and was thrilled by the news.

"All the best players are going to play in AFL," DePino said. "You see so many studs that go there and then in a couple years, they're in the big leagues, and they're some of the best players there. Like one of the kids that I know is Kevin McGonigle -- he was the MVP last year, and then now he's going to win Rookie of the Year in the big leagues, so it's pretty sick."

DePino finished his regular season hitting .262/.363/.481 with 25 homers, 21 doubles and two triples. The power showed up after struggling to get the ball off the ground in his draft year, but he cited a rising strikeout rate as an area of fall and offseason focus, as it crept up on him from 23 percent in May to 32 percent in August over his first full season.

A Connecticut native and Rhode Island Ram who said he'd never played south of New Jersey until traveling for a game against William & Mary his freshman year in college, DePino passed on blaming heat and humidity for his up-and-down second half.

"It's definitely hot, for sure. It's hot," DePino said. "But I would say it's definitely better than playing up in Rhode Island where it's the complete opposite [end] of the spectrum, right? The beginning of our seasons, we're looking at 25-, 30-degree games. Down here at the end of the season you're looking at, like, 100-105-degree games, So there's two [ends of the spectrum], but it's definitely nicer to play in the heat. The ball goes way further, it's a little more enjoyable, you're not freezing, so it's nice."

DePino played all but nine of his defensive innings at first base, but said he'll still be working at third base in the fall to maintain versatility. After the AFL season concludes, he'll head back to Connecticut, where he works with former big leaguer Eric Campbell.

"It'll be good to be back up north and kind of reset for a little bit and then get right back to it," DePino said. "There's really not much time off because every day that you're not working, there's someone else who's working."

Colby Shelton opened the regular season in an infield with Bonemer and DePino at Winston-Salem, and finished the regular season in an infield with Bonemer and DePino in Birmingham. Now he's heading to Arizona as part of a Glendale Desert Dogs roster that includes Bonemer and DePino.

"We're all close friends," Shelton said. "We get to spend more time together and just kind of work on this journey together. It's definitely comfortable."

Drafted in the sixth round out of Florida in 2025, Shelton showed two disparate forms during his collegiate career. He hit 20 homers in 66 games his sophomore season, but batted just .254 with 82 strikeouts. In his draft year, he raised his average to .377 and struck out just 24 times over 45 games, but sacrificed power to get to his hit tool, homering just seven times.

After hitting .244/.338/.488 with 24 homers, three triples and 34 doubles against a 23 percent strikeout rate over 127 games during his first full professional season, Shelton is still fine-tuning the balance, but it's closer to where he wants it.

He first had to weather a difficult first two months at Double-A, during which he hit .170/.240/.327. The strikeout rate and ground-ball rates didn't throw red flags, but a .191 BABIP showed the hits still weren't falling.

"feel I feel like it's as you move up levels, guys get to more balls, they can get to more balls, make more plays," Shelton said. "It's part of the game, and you only can control what you control."

Also, Shelton learned that Southern League pitchers are better at controlling what they can control.

"Once you get to Double-A, pitchers have better command and they know what they're trying to do, so they can attack your weakness and expose you," Shelton said. "If you can't make an adjustment, and they're just going to keep going to that pitch, or whatever you struggle with until you make that adjustment and prove that you can lay off that pitch or hit it, and then they'll go to something different."

Shelton's playing time has been split between second, short and third during his first two seasons in the pros, as the White Sox have had to contend with an influx at shortstops. As the organization figures out who is playing where -- which includes Bonemer getting reps in the outfield, as we've already discussed -- Shelton sounds open to anything.

"I feel like it's great to play all three, learn all three positions, but also to be flexible." Shelton said. "Anywhere in the infield, I'm comfortable. This is most I've bounced around at any position in my career, so just I feel like it's very beneficial playing short, third, second -- just wherever the team needs me."

Grant Magill rounds out the position-player delegation the White Sox are sending to Arizona, and that news caught the 25-year-old catcher off-guard.

"Originally, I talked to a Dominican team, so I was thinking about playing in the Dominican Republic for winter ball," Magill said. "But [the White Sox] asked me to play, and I was just super excited. Obviously I want to play in the AFL versus that right now. It's just it's a great opportunity, and I'm stoked."

Magill came to the White Sox as an undrafted free agent in 2024 after five years at Indiana State on the strength of his defense behind the plate, and that's carried over to the pros. White Sox coaches value his catching and throwing, which was why Boston Smith bounced between catcher, left field and DH during his brief, meteoric rise in the White Sox organization before being dealt to Seattle in the Luis Castillo trade.

With Birmingham, Magill cut down 32 of 89 runners, good for a 41-percent caught-stealing rate that nearly doubled the league average. His presence -- or the absence of it -- stood out over the final weekend of the season. Magill didn't play on Friday, and the Knoxville Smokies stole a whopping 11 bases in 11 attempts. He started on Saturday, and the Smokies settled for going 1-for-1.

Magill doesn't take 100 percent of the credit for that 41-percent kill rate, but said he stresses how pitchers can help themselves.

"A lot goes into throwing a runner out," Magill said. "There's pitcher time to the plate, there's how they're holding runners, how long they're coming set for, how fast their leg is to the plate, and obviously, if I do get a chance, putting the throw on the bag. Everything has to come together for the guy to get out, but in my opinion, I think just talking to your pitchers, if you get them to understand the worth of a runner being out versus on second base.

"A good thing that I like to tell pitchers is if you give up a single and then you let the guy walk into second, you basically gave up a double. And if you were to look at the stats of a runner getting to second base with no outs in an inning, of how many times he scores, it's probably unreal. It's probably, I bet it's like a 70 or 75 percent clip, which is basically him scoring every time. I kind of tell them, 'If you give me a chance, I'm gonna throw my best throw, I'm gonna get him out, hopefully.' And who doesn't want an out versus a guy on second base with nobody out?

"I just try and hammer it home that if you give me a chance, I'm going to do my best. And I think the more that you prove that, like, if you give me a chance, I'll throw them out, they're like, "OK, why don't I want to be quick to the plate?'"

Offensive improvements are required before Grant Taylor Magill can catch Grant Alan Taylor in a major league game. Magill hit .237/.297/.366 over 291 plate appearances during the regular season, the last 160 of which came in Birmingham. He started hot before finishing the season 6-for-69, but even his more productive spells were accompanied by an elevated strikeout rate, resulting in some tweaks being deployed in-season aimed at "being in a better position earlier." Alongside the mechanical changes is an attempt to be more aggressive early in the count, and offseason bat-speed training to make more of his better contact on those A-swings.

When Magill gets to Arizona, he'll have first-hand experience catching all five of the pitchers the White Sox are sending to Glendale. Pierce George, Mathias LaCombe, Jonathan Clark and Garrett Wright all spent time with both the Dash and Barons this season, and Nick Altermatt threw to Magill for two months at Birmingham before his promotion to Charlotte.