The White Sox announced this afternoon that they’ve designated catcher Drew Romo and right-hander Jairo Iriarte for assignment. The moves make room for Jordan Hicks and David Sandlin on the club’s 40-man roster after Chicago acquired the pair from Boston earlier today.
Romo, 24, is a former first-round pick by the Rockies. Drafted 35th overall back in 2022, Romo eventually received some buzz on top-100 prospect lists but so far has just 19 games total under his belt in the major leagues. All of those came in Colorado, for whom he slashed just .167/.196/.222 with a 37.5% strikeout rate and a wRC+ of 3, indicating he was 97% worse than league average. Those numbers come as part of a sample size of just 56 trips to the plate, meaning that it’s hard to draw any major conclusions from them. Even so, it’s hardly an exciting performance that does little to offer confidence in Romo’s talents going forward.
Last year saw his Triple-A numbers take a tumble as well, as he hit just .264/.329/.409 with Albuquerque last year. That’s good for a wRC+ of just 75 in the Pacific Coast League’s inflated offensive environment. Romo’s struggles at Triple-A and in the majors led the Rockies to designate him for assignment. He’s bounced around the league in the months since then and was claimed off waivers by the White Sox last month. He remained in the organization for just a few weeks, and now will once again be subject to the waiver wire unless the White Sox can work out a trade involving Romo in the coming days. If Romo passes through waivers successfully, the White Sox will have the opportunity to stash him in Triple-A as catching depth behind the club’s current trio of Kyle Teel, Korey Lee, and Edgar Quero.
As for Iriarte, the right-hander signed with the Padres out of Venezuela as an amateur and spent most of his career in the San Diego system. He was acquired by the White Sox as part of the return for Dylan Cease prior to the 2024 season and made his big league debut with Chicago later that year. He posted a 1.50 ERA in six innings of work, albeit with more walks (eight) than strikeouts (six). He didn’t make an appearance for the White Sox in the majors last year amid deep struggles at Triple-A, where he posted a 7.24 ERA in 46 innings with a 16.7% walk rate. That wildness has now cost Iriarte his spot on the team’s 40-man roster. Like Romo, the White Sox will have one week to either trade Iriarte or try to pass him through waivers. If he passes through waivers unclaimed, he’ll head to Triple-A as a non-roster depth option for Chicago headed into 2026.
Not who I would have expected. Should be Hudson and Hill
Kinda surprised they let Iriarte go
I’m irate
Welcome back to San Diego, Jairo!
Yup
Damn, another former padres starting pitching prospect doesn’t pan out. Not a top 100 guy, but he was just outside of it when he was packaged with Thorpe for Cease.
Thorpe, Iriate, Wilson, and Zavala. Zavala is still in the minors, but Thorpe looks like a good future piece, and Wilson was traded.
Thorpe might be a good piece, but he’s a soft tossing righty (11th percentile in velocity when he debuted) recovering from TJ. To make matters worse he had only made 9 starts before needing surgery and is sitting on 1 year and 111 days of service time. I’d bet on him not making it to free agency with 6 years of service time so it’s likely a moot point.
Zavala looked good 3 years ago but is still in A+ and seen his stock drop a lot (last ranked as the CHW 29th best prospect by MLB & 23rd by Fangraphs) as a 40 FV guy.
Steven Wilson imploded in the pen after the trade, and was since traded to the Rays.
I’d take the 4th round comp pick from Cease leaving over either Thorpe or Zavala today.
Thorpe is better than a 4th round pick but the Padres won that trade easily.
The White Sox were never going to pay Cease $200 million anyway, so “winning” the trade is not really relevant. They were not willing to give Carlos Rodon a qualifying offer, so it is no guarantee that they would have given one to Cease.
I would imagine someone like the Nationals claim Iriate.
How many times has Romo been DFA’d this offseason?
I think 4
Romo has gone from the Rockies to Orioles to Mets to White Sox, and now another DFA this off- season. I feel sorry for the guy.
Other guys that have been bouncing around are Osvaldo Bido and Marco Luciano.
Maybe Luciano should try his hand at singing
Don’t forget Cheng
The other Taiwanese friend, Kai Wei Teng, has had better luck.
He hasn’t had to physically move houses yet as there haven’t been any games played, which is a silver lining. Kind of surprised he’s the one getting bounced around as much as he has though because even if he isn’t very good right now teams still do need a deep pool of catchers, and he’s a former top-100 prospect that’s still fairly young.
No cry
Yeah, Sox ade a few good moves but now we’re getting back to bad, they should’ve designated Cory Lee, Romo is a better batter. Iriarte is ranked high in the system. Please DFA Hill. Its getting bad.
Iniarte is ranked 30th in the organizational prospect list. That’s not very high, and given that the White Sox system has been rather abysmal for years that’s even worse. He made his debut and did okay for a couple of innings but when you look at his stats in the minor leagues he’s actually been very bad.
David Sandlin is better?
If you’re the White Sox you just throw a dart at the wall and whoever it lands on is who you DFA. There’s a lot of slop in that roster. Just so happened to be Iniarte this time. I’m more puzzled by the Romo DFA because at the very least he could be a solid 2nd/3rd string catcher.
Exactly, Hicks contract is objectively terrible. I’d much rather they spend $5–7M on a legitimate fifth starter like Littell or Canning. And if they’re carrying three catchers, Heim over Lee is a far better use of the money.
Exactly, and Hicks’ contract is objectively terrible. I’d much rather they spend $5–7M on a legitimate fifth starter like Littell or Canning. And if they’re carrying three catchers, Heim over Lee is a far better use of the money.
Fair observations
Cory Lee is going to be playing in the major leagues for the next 6 years.
If he doesn’t fix his k to bb he should be in AAA
Hitting is a secondary concern for very good defensive catchers. He is a perfect #2 catcher.