White Sox Outright A.J. Alexy

The White Sox have sent right-hander A.J. Alexy outright to Triple-A Charlotte, tweets Scott Merkin of MLB.com. Since there’d been no indication that Alexy was designated for assignment, the move frees a spot on the 40-man roster. The roster count now sits at 39.

Chicago added Alexy off waivers from the Twins in January. He’d bounced around the league last offseason, going from the Rangers to the Nationals to Minnesota before landing in Chicago. All those transactions were via waivers aside from the move from Washington to Minnesota, which saw the Twins send a minor league pitcher to the Nats in a small trade.

Alexy held his roster spot with the Sox into the regular season. He was optioned to Charlotte in Spring Training. The 25-year-old has started four games for the Knights but been hit hard in ten innings. He’s allowed 17 runs, largely thanks to a staggering 18 walks out of 54 batters faced (exactly one third). Alexy has been an inconsistent strike-thrower throughout his career but has never battled his control to this extent. The Pennsylvania native has walked 12.8% of opponents over 406 1/3 career innings in the minor leagues.

While Alexy hasn’t pitched at the MLB level this season, he got there with Texas between 2021-22. Over 30 innings, he worked to a 6.30 ERA as a swingman. Alexy averaged north of 94 MPH on his fastball but had more walks than strikeouts in that brief look. He’d punched out a decent 23.5% of batters faced with a 5.91 ERA in 96 Triple-A frames last year.

Alexy has never previously been outrighted and doesn’t have three years of major league service. He therefore won’t be able to elect free agency. He’ll stick with Charlotte and look to get his strike-throwing back on track to put himself on the radar for an MLB look later this season. Alexy would qualify for minor league free agency at the end of the year if he’s not on the 40-man roster by that point.