White Sox Place Drew Thorpe On IL With Flexor Strain

The White Sox announced they’ve placed rookie starter Drew Thorpe on the 15-day injured list, retroactive to August 1, with a flexor strain. Chicago recalled Prelander Berroa to take his spot on the MLB roster before tonight’s game against the Twins.

Thorpe told reporters this evening that imaging didn’t reveal anything serious (X link via Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times). He expressed hope he could be back on an MLB mound within a few weeks. The 23-year-old is nine starts into his MLB career. His first crack at major league hitters hasn’t gone well, as he’s allowing 5.48 earned runs per nine over 44 1/3 innings. Thorpe’s 13.2% strikeout rate is well below average and his 11.1% walk rate is a few points higher than the league mark. It’s a rough start, but the former second-round pick was a top prospect coming into the year.

The 6’4″ Thorpe was at the center of two of last winter’s biggest trades. He went from the Yankees to the Padres as one of the key pieces in the Juan Soto blockbuster at the Winter Meetings. San Diego flipped him to the Sox as the headliner of the Dylan Cease return halfway through Spring Training. Thorpe started his Sox tenure in Double-A and dominated to the tune of a 1.35 ERA in 11 starts before being promoted directly to the big leagues.

Chicago is 27-84. They’ve lost 17 in a row and have three wins since the end of June. They’re likely to end up with one of the worst records in league history, with the only question for this season being whether they’ll avoid joining the 1962 Mets as the only team since 1900 to lose 120 games. Beyond that, the next couple months are solely about keeping everyone healthy and evaluating players whom the Sox hope to be long-term pieces.

Thorpe certainly qualifies given his prospect pedigree. The Sox figure to be exceedingly careful with a forearm injury for an important young arm in a lost season. Thorpe has logged 104 1/3 frames between Double-A and the majors this year after throwing 139 1/3 innings in his first professional season. He might have stayed in the rotation for the rest of the season if not for the injury since he wasn’t coming up on any kind of innings limit.