The White Sox released Jared Walsh from his minor league contract, according to the MLB.com transaction log. The former All-Star first baseman heads back to free agency.
Walsh broke camp with the Rangers while Nathaniel Lowe was injured. The lefty hitter turned in a .226/.317/.321 line in 60 plate appearances spanning 17 games. Texas designated Walsh for assignment and sent him back to free agency once Lowe was ready for reinstatement. The White Sox signed him a week later and sent him to Triple-A Charlotte.
While it was a sensible depth pickup, Walsh hasn’t produced against minor league pitching over the last couple months. He has gone down on strikes at a 36.9% clip. Even with a robust 12.1% walk rate and eight home runs, the whiffs resulted in a meager .185/.289/.415 slash. That wasn’t going to be enough to earn a look even on a clear rebuilding team.
Walsh was a middle-of-the-order presence for the Angels between 2020-21, connecting on 29 homers in the latter campaign. He hasn’t been the same player over the past three years. That’s largely on account of injury, as Walsh’s ’22 season was cut short by thoracic outlet syndrome. He has struggled to make contact against both MLB and Triple-A pitching since returning. Walsh fanned at a near-35% clip in Triple-A with the Angels last season. He has struck out more than 37% of the time in the majors since the start of last season, hitting .159/.250/.293 over his most recent 176 big league plate appearances.
Walsh is Washed
I have become a Chris Getz fan. Walsh is washed, but Getz has given a whole lot of “auditions” while we lose in search of future help/assets. Erick Fedde, Tommy Pham, Paul DeJong, Chris Flexen and John Brebbia are all among the tradeables that Getz signed. Cheap signings bringing back kids.
They’ve had to sign all these washed vets because Getz failed so horribly as farm director that there’s no intriguing options in the minors.
I don’t think he was given much talent to begin with when he was the farm director.
A fan of Chris Getz??
I believe he deserves another year to get this team in the right direction.
I don’t see the Wsox having a winning season til 2026 or 2027 tbh.
I’d call it lottery tickets more than kids. Because you can’t guarantee anything positive coming out of this system, aside from left-handed lanky relievers-turned starters.
Your not wrong.
Man, he looked so good before he got Covid and all time likable Angel. I hope he gets at least one more glory season.
Look no further than his thoracic outlet syndrome (TOS). A lot of fans forget Walsh was also a pitcher and TOS can kill a career. Matt Harvey and Steven Strasburg are two main examples.
Dude needs to take the rest of the year off, or go to Japan. He might’ve been overrated, but he is nowhere close to being this bad.
Time to go to the NPB, KBO or Mexican Baseball League and recover his swing against easier pitching.
I just can’t wait to see who they roll out in their lineups.
The stands should be filled and jumping with excitement from the fans. Reinsdorf will have to hire a couple more accountants to count all the money that will be rolling in. Jerry’s a real baseball management genius.
Can you imagine the narrative around this organization, if Doug Eddings called Strike Theee on A J, instead of standing there dumbfounded. The WS rings wouldn’t have happened.
Are you talking about the ball in the dirt that was called a foul tip during the Angels series in 2005?
You assume they would have lost that game. It was 1-1 at that point. If A.J had been rung up, they go to the 11th inning I believe. Angels we’re having trouble enough scoring runs in that series. I’d assume they’d go on to lose even had A.J been struck out. He wasn’t! World Series Champions 2005, your Chicago White Sox!
Are you talking about that one time at band camp?
Dog troll the creepy stalker
it was a fairly low bar to beat out the Knights 1b options and he couldn’t do it.
Can he get back with the James Gang?
Yes, I believe so, if he decides to ‘Walk Away’ from baseball.
With the White Sox big dead weight purge ongoing, maybe fangraphs prediction of a much better second half isn’t so farfetched.
Hard to see how they’d improve when most of their respectable major leaguers will be on the move in trades. More likely they get back on pace for the worst record in history,
On pace for 45-117 as of rn.
I won’t be surprised if they managed to match the 2023 A’s.
Life’s been good for him so far
Fine work. Well done sir.
They are no longer going to Jared.