[ad_1]
The White Sox announced Monday they have reinstated the center fielder Louis robert from the 60-day injured list. Outfielder / first baseman Gavin leaves was optioned to Triple-A Charlotte in order to open a spot on the active list. Minor League Voltigeur Luis González was released to open a place on the 40-man list.
Gonzalez’s release may initially come as a surprise to some fans, given he has been among the organization’s top 10-20 prospects in recent years, but he is set to undergo end-of-season shoulder surgery, James Fegan by The Athletic tweets. Injured players cannot be placed on outright waivers, so the team’s only recourse was to either release Gonzalez or add him to the MLB roster and place him on the injured roster. Major League for 60 days. The Sox will go the old path and presumably look to re-sign him to a new minor league contract, as is pretty common in these cases.
As for the dynamic Robert, he will return after missing more than three months due to a grade 3 hip flexor suffered in early May. The injury initially required a 12-16 week rehabilitation period, and it will return at the shorter end of this schedule. Robert has appeared in a dozen minor league rehab games – four in Advanced Class A and eight in Triple A – and had a combined score of 0.268 / .388 / .390.
Robert, 24, won a golden glove and finished second behind Kyle lewis in the American League Rookie of the Year vote. He’s played 81 big-league games at this point in his young career, hitting .259 / .320 / .444 with 12 homers, 17 doubles, a triple and 13 interceptions (in 16 attempts). Strikes have been a problem (30.6%), but Robert has been considered an elite prospect since leaving Cuba and signing with the Sox for a bonus of $ 26 million ( which came with a $ 26 million overrun penalty for Chicago, whose bonus pool was just north of $ 2.9 million at the time). He then signed a six-year, $ 50 million contract extension with a pair of club options even before preparing for his first big league game.
The White Sox lost Robert and Eloy Jimenez at the start of the 2021 season, but they managed to roll a weak Central American League nonetheless, building a 10.5-game lead over the Indians in second place at the time of writing. With Robert and Jimenez now back from injury and Craig kimbrel in the back of the box, the South Siders are as strong as they have been anytime this season. The division title has long looked like a doom, but the return of their promising young outfielder and a few key pickups on schedule have better positioned the Sox as a playoff threat.
[ad_2]
Source link