Success, injuries make White Sox 40-man roster tougher to pare down

The Offseason Plan Project will launch later this week, and if you were hanging on every pitch of the White Sox's postseason run and pushing off thoughts of 2027 as long as possible, then there's a lot less time for mapping out the various sections of your blueprint.

The center of it all is the existing 40-man roster, which will actually take some level of finessing after years of being able to overhaul a third of it with little thought about any long-term ramifications.

It starts with the fact that there are currently 46 players on the 40-man roster, as six guys are currently on the 60-day injured list and will require reinstatement after the season. The good news is that this matches the number of impending free agents, so unlike the Giants, who have a whopping 17 players on the 60-day injured list, the White Sox won't be forced to make any difficult decisions by routine accounting:

Following that are a couple other firm dates where the White Sox are required to to make 40-man calls. One is Nov. 17, which is the deadline to protect players from the Rule 5 draft, and the other is the non-tender deadline on Nov. 20. These dates typically present natural opportunities for shedding and/or moving players, and they produced a flurry of moves last season with the trades for Murray, Everson Pereira and Chris Murphy.

But with the hot stove season set to be put in the deep freezer on Dec. 2 if Major League Baseball indeed locks out the players, it seems like the White Sox won't necessarily be able to wait for those deadlines to inspire roster revisions. They'll likely have to cut sooner, which brings the names on the 60-day IL into the conversation.

Now, they can open a couple spaces on the 40-man roster without weighing the injury cases. Junior Pérez struck out in 37 percent of his plate appearances at Charlotte, and the trade for Brenton Doyle threw another right-handed center fielder between Pérez and the 26-man roster. Joey Bart also doesn't seem long for the roster since the White Sox have three other catchers on the 40-man, and it's more a matter of whether he's non-tendered by the Sox or traded to another team that gets to make that decision.

After that, you start bringing Rikuu Nishida and Jonathan Cannon into the conversation, as they're the only other healthy players on the 40-man who didn't spend significant chunks of time in Chicago. The White Sox could try outrighting either, but Nishida's versatility, Triple-A production and personality make him an asset to the system, and Cannon threw 125 innings for an organization that struggled to get innings, so both are calls the White Sox probably don't want to make lightly.

After that, unless there's an appetite to start debating the statuses of Tyler Schweitzer or Chris Murphy, that's when we get to the guys on the 60-day injured list, and start wondering whether some have played their last games in the White Sox organization.

Leasure is the most vulnerable after undergoing Tommy John surgery in August. His second UCL repair takes him out of play for 2027, and since the White Sox non-tendered Tim Elko under similar-but-less-severe circumstances last November, Leasure's arbitration eligibility puts him on the same chopping block.

Then you get to Berroa and Bush, who have faced a combined total of one batter in game action over the last two seasons due to Tommy John surgeries, and complications in their recoveries afterward. Berroa walked the only batter he faced before his first and only rehab appearance with the ACL White Sox on May 13 was cut short. He was supposed to start throwing again in September, but nothing came of it. That's still better than Bush fared, as he suffered a setback in his attempt to ramp up, and was eventually shut down for the season with a strained lat. Both were pitching prospects of note, but that's a long time to go without throwing.

Perhaps the White Sox take similar looks at Baldwin and Murray, as the former missed the entire season with Tommy John surgery, and the latter underwent season-ending surgery after fracturing his shoulder making a diving catch in April. It strikes me as less likely, if only because after watching Colson Montgomery and Luisangel Acuña over the final two months, the White Sox don't seem like they're in any position to ditch any potential compelling in-house options at shortstop, especially ones with minor league options remaining.

The only one who feels immune from such speculation is Vasil, the rare player who underwent Tommy John surgery in spring training but avoided missing the season. His transition to dugout wizard won't show up on his Baseball-Reference.com page, but if the White Sox wanted him to be that present while sidelined, then it stands to reason that he'll get every opportunity to reclaim his spot in the White Sox bullpen. Everybody else is on notice.