The White Sox have outrighted hurler Dylan Covey to Triple-A Charlotte, per the International League transactions page. Covey has been outrighted before, so he’ll be allowed to decline the assignment in favor of free agency if he wants. It’s unclear if that will happen.
The right-handed Covey lost his spot on Chicago’s 40-man roster when the team designated him Jan. 14 to clear space for newly signed reliever Steve Cishek. Covey had been a fairly regular option in the White Sox’s pitching staff over the previous three seasons, but his time in the majors hasn’t gone well.
So far, Covey has combined for 250 1/3 innings (63 appearances, 45 starts) of 6.54 ERA/5.57 FIP ball in the bigs. Despite boasting a fastball that averages upward of 94 mph, Covey has struggled to limit home runs (1.62 per nine) and miss bats, having fanned just over six hitters per nine while walking more than four. Dating back to 2017, his K/BB ratio (1.52) ranks fifth worst among 193 pitchers who have thrown at least 200 innings.
While Covey has made double-digit starts in each of his three MLB seasons, he almost certainly won’t total that many in 2020 even if he does remain with the White Sox organization. The club has been aggressive in upgrading its rotation this winter, having signed southpaws Dallas Keuchel and Gio Gonzalez. They’re part of a group that should also include a mix of Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez, Dylan Cease, Michael Kopech and Carlos Rodon (when he returns from Tommy John surgery) during the upcoming season.
Regardless of whether Covey sticks with his current franchise, it appears he’ll have to improve his stock in the minors. The 28-year-old has been quite effective in Triple-A ball, where he owns a 2.63 ERA with 7.9 K/9 and 2.4 BB/9 in 95 2/3 frames.
Good riddance!
He is not necessarily gone!
He just declared free agency, so he is officially gone. Good for him
But he’s never really officially gone.
Huge Sox fan here. I was explaining to my cubs fan friend last year why I can’t stand this guy and its because every time I’m at a game he comes in and everything is hit in the vicinity of the warning track. So happy to see this article, hope he is out of the Sox system. Good bye “warning track guy.” I hope I never can say “oh great, here comes the warning track guy!” again.
I guess you didn’t understand the plan’. Covey was part of the 8 year tank job. He was supposed to be giving up bombs every time he came in. How do you think it allowed them to draft guys like Carson Fulmer and Zack Collins.
Dogbone, Cubbie Clown?
Excuse you, it’s Dogboner.
What part of California you from? There is no way you live in Chicago. Guessing you became a fan around 8th grade during the 2004 run. Definitely still sporting a Mark Prior jersey when you come visit Chicago every other year. Next time you’re here check out Navy Pier. The tourist love it.
You live a sad life.
At least he doesnt live on a peanut farm, mr president
Uhhh I’m going to assume you don’t know baseball if you think Fulmer and Collins are good
What? Fulmer and Collins were drafted before Covey was signed by the Sox (2017).
But you are correct, Covey is quite possibly the best “tank” pitcher of all time. But now that we’re done with tanking, it makes no sense to keep him. Sox should’ve released him
Looking at his stats the reason for his struggles with those warning track balls was due to his ineffective slider and curve. Both had below average movement. His best pitch was his sinker/split finger as it ranked pretty high in 2018. If he could fine tune the repertoire, maybe scrap the slider/curve I think he could be pretty decent in the majors in terms of a bullpen arm. While he did have a low ERA in the minors, he still had a high BABIP and ERA estimators, so the minors stats don’t tell the whole story.
Outside of Giolito the rotation is still pretty trash. And even Giolito got his head kicked in a few times after the all star break
Cease Kopech Lopez all have tremendous upside and stuff. Still young and controllable.
And Keuchel… trash is a bit overstated I’d say
“Outside of Giolito the rotation is still pretty young and talented”
Fixed.
And he got rocked by the Cubs twice and Minny once… That’s it. He also bounced back and shut Minnesota out with 3 hits, 0 walks, and 12 K’s the next time he faced them.
“Outside of Keuchel and Giolito, the rotation is largely young and unproven, or comes with significant injury concerns.”
I fixed it for you.
Both “pretty young and talented” and “unproven, or comes with significant injury concerns” are correct. At his best, Kopech can throw over 100mph with a well-above-average slider. At his worst, he’s under the knife again and is never the same guy. At his best, Cease is the guy who was the Pipeline Pitcher of the Year in 2018; at his worst, he’s a back-of-the-rotation guy. We won’t know until they have more time to pitch. Giolito suffered through a terrible first full season before becoming a star. They could take that path, flame out like Covey and Fulmer, or shine all year. Only one I’d argue against is that the rotation is trash. It’s very unlikely to be as good as Cleveland’s, but I’m thinking middle-of-the-pack is a very realistic goal.
Rotation isn’t trash. It has potential to be very good.
But that would require all players hitting their upsides. I think Kopech can do that, because he has the best stuff. Cease has a chance, although his lack of control may limit him. Lopez belongs in the bullpen, Rodon should have been designated and you don’t know what you are going to get out of Dunning at this point.
But just like people need to be realistic with Madrigal and Robert, they need to be realistic with the pitching staff. Even if 2021 is great, this year could be really ugly for a period for a lot of these players.
The good thing is, only two or three of those guys need to come through. But I think projects that have the rotation running on all cylinders this season are foolish. Frankly, I have more faith in Dunning sticking in a rotation than Lopez or Cease, because he is more polished and has better command. Lopez barely has two pitches and had a FIP last year over 5. And he has had more than 75 starts.
Agree with you on Lopez, don’t want to agree on Rodon, but more because he’s cheap with all the injuries than because I believe in his future. He’s shown that he can be effective when healthy, but he’s just so rarely healthy. I think Cease has a higher ceiling than Dunning. Whether he becomes a better pitcher will depend on how well he harnesses his stuff. Of all of them, the only one I’m convinced will be in the rotation long-term is Kopech because of the stuff. A little more control and seasoning you have a potentially dominant starter in a few years.
My expectations of Madrigal are more tempered than mine of Robert. Madrigal still won’t strike out much in the majors and the glove will translate well, but I think he suffers through an adjustment period, made worse by his utter lack of power. Robert has more swing-and-miss (who doesn’t?), but he can tap into his raw power and just dominated AAA last year. I’m not expecting some All-Star season where he slashes .290/.370/.550 with 30HRs and 25SBs, but he is realistically one of the early favorites for RoY.
I think if neither Kopech or Cease can breakout, we’re going to have some serious problems with the rotation, not just for 2020 but beyond that unless we get some outside help. We also can’t count Giolito as a surefire bet either; he could easily regress in 2020, but let’s hope he doesn’t.
Oh I see, so they’ll still be rocking ERAs in the high 5s but they have baby faces so it makes it all okay. Gotcha
You just described Greg Maddux’s first full season at the major league level.
You’re right. Elite young talent never improves. They were stupid to not move on from Moncada and Giolito after 2018.
Having a bad ERA in your first full year means little. Randy Johnson sported a 4.62 ERA his first full season. Greg Maddux posted a 5.61. Felix Hernandez was at 4.52. And Johan Santana was at 5.90 through his first 130 or so MLB innings. Obviously, it’s better to come up and be good immediately, but the only ones on that roster who are running out of opportunities to prove they belong are Rodon due to injuries and Lopez.
Classic AAAA player, as mentioned earlier he might make it back as a bullpen arm but his run as a starter should be over (unless you’re tanking).
Bullpen might be an option. 94 goes to 97 and he becomes a two pitch pitcher.
Since when do you get an automatic 3 mph upgrade? Show me some data here killer
Since when do you get an automatic 3 mph upgrade? Show me some data here killer
He’s just saying that you don’t have to save anything for later innings and just air it all out for 1-2 innings. Now covey is still terrible either way but that’s what usually happens when starters go to the pen
Bullpen arm isn’t an option. Last year the guy gave up *6 runs* without recording an out. That is too terrible to even be a bullpen piece. Dude will be 29 in a few months, he’s not some kid who “just needs more chances”, Let’s call him a bust and give some of the other pitchers like Dunning and Stiever in AAA a chance. We as fans have seen enough of Covey.
Thanks for the help with the tanking, Dylan. Nobody could have done it better.
Go White Sox!
Hope he declines the assignment and latches on with a quality pitching coach. The Sox clearly couldn’t get anything out of him.
I hope he’s gone. Same with Fulmer. It’ll cap off a great offseason.
As I said before, he got a raw deal with the White Sox, because people have been saying for years he is better suited in a relief role.
If they aren’t committed to seeing what he can do as a reliever, he’s better off seeking greener pastures.
A lot of people are saying the White Sox still won’t have a good rotation overall, and it’s true that they are highly unlikely to compete with the likes of, say, Cleveland, this year, but getting rid of Covey and the revolving door that was the #5 spot last year and replacing them with Keuchel and Gio makes for a couple significant upgrades. It’s kind of amazing the Sox won as many games as they did last year with a middle-of-the-road BP, a terrible rotation outside of Giolito, no RF or DH production to speak of, and Adam “what is this bat thing of which you speak?” Engel patrolling CF.
They outperformed their pythag by 3 games, played in the worst division in the AL, got .360 BABIP from McCann, .400 BABIPs from Moncada and Anderson, had the luckiest Closer in MLB and still only won 72 games.
Keuchel had a FIP of almost 5 last year, while Gio Gonzalez barely throws innings and also saw a dramatic increase in FIP last year. This might not be the upgrade you think it is. In fact, with the financial commitment to Keuchel spanning 3 (and more likely 4 given the easily accessible option) years…things are likely to be a lot worse than simply going into the year with Covey and not signing Keuchel.
Sure, Keuchel could change his narrative. But at his age and given that he’s never been a stuff guy…that seems unlikely.
I guess some people just don’t appreciate the beauty of a 1.75 WHIP, an ERA of 8, and a 1-11 W-L record.
He’s been hard to watch, because when he is right that 96 mph heavy sinker is really hard to hit. He’s had some great starts – in 2018 he went 8 1/3 shutout innings against Seattle and had back-to-back 6 IP shutout starts against Cleveland along with the 1-0 game against Boston where he out-dueled Chris Sale. He simply is too inconsistent and hasn’t been able to hit his spots enough, and his secondary pitches aren’t good enough to miss spots. There is still some potential there, but probably needs a change of organizations at this point to see if someone else can help him.
This is addition through subtraction.
I’ve always rooted for this kid after his health issues arose when he was drafted by Milwaukee. Hope he turns it around.
Probably will sign with the tigers. They seem to enjoy pitchers that blow.