It goes without saying that there are far-reaching effects of Minor League Baseball not holding a season in 2020. People’s livelihoods are on the line with franchises not able to play games this year.
While that reality is true for different kinds of front office and game day staff, some players are going to see their careers drastically impacted as well. It’s reasonable to think players who would have had a roster spot in 2020 under normal circumstances may find themselves in limbo in 2021.
The minors are tracking towards contracting 40 affiliated teams in 2021. The White Sox could lose rookie affiliate Great Falls. Fewer affiliates means fewer roster spots to go around, which means a lot of players are at risk. So who loses the most from there not being a 2020 minor league season?
2019 college draft picks
Andrew Vaughn, the first-round pick out of Cal last year, will be fine. He is on the Summer Camp roster for the White Sox so he will get some gametime this year. The next three picks from the White Sox 2019 draft were high schoolers. The missed development time will hurt (as it will for everyone in the minors), but they are young enough to be able to afford a lost season.
The other players the White Sox drafted out of college last year will be put in particularly tough spots going forward. In order to save money in their signing bonus pool, the White Sox drafted college seniors in rounds 5-10.
Fifth-round pick Dan Metzdorf had a decent stint in 14 starts with Great Falls last summer. He’s now 24 with no experience above rookie ball.
Sixth-rounder Avery Weems was very good in rookie ball (2.09 ERA, 74 K, 10 BB in 60.1 IP between both rookie ball levels). He turned 23 on June 1 so he’s not as old as Metzdorf, but this is a left-hander who showed some potential but is now behind the curve.
Karan Patel (seventh round), Ivan Gonzalez (eighth) and Tyson Messer (ninth) will all be 24 by opening day 2021 and will not have played above rookie ball. Nate Pawelczyk (10th round) turned 23 on June 9.
Age isn’t the most important thing for a prospect, but with Great Falls likely leaving the White Sox will need to find somewhere for their younger pitchers to go. Matthew Thompson and Andrew Dalquist, high school picks from last year’s draft, and even Jared Kelley from this year’s draft will likely head to Kannapolis to get experience. If rotation spots are already taken by those three, there isn’t much room left for guys like Metzdorf.
Outfield crunch gets tighter
The White Sox had a glut of outfield prospects in 2019, which led to some awkward assignments. Double-A Birmingham had Luis Gonzalez and Blake Rutherford the whole season and Luis Robert, Luis Alexander Basabe, Micker Adolfo and Joel Booker for parts of the season. There wasn’t always room for all of them.
A similar crunch could exist in 2021 in different levels of the system. Robert won’t be in the minors and Booker is 26 and not much of a prospect at this point, but Gonzalez, Rutherford and Basabe could all be Triple-A worthy outfielders by 2021. That could push out some veteran outfielders like Daniel Palka and Nicky Delmonico.
Further down the system, and similar to the college pitchers above, are older players like Alex Destino and Ian Dawkins at risk? Both have solid first full pro seasons in Kannapolis in 2019, but turn 25 later this year. Do the White Sox give them a first shot at Winston-Salem at 25 years old? Should they be pushed to Double-A in a sink or swim move? Do they just let them go?
Any player who was already a bit old for the level they were playing at is now further at risk.
Jake Burger
No reason to lump this one into a general group because Burger’s circumstances are unique. The 2017 first-round pick has had multiple Achilles’ injuries and that has decimated his pro career to this point.
He missed all of 2018 and 2019 and will now miss all of 2020 as well. That’s an insane chunk of time to miss and try to be a professional baseball player on the other end of that.
Burger is still on the comeback trail and is fully healthy now. He showed off his workouts in some videos posted to Twitter:
After missing two years due to injuries, Burger now misses a third year due to a pandemic canceling the 2020 minor league season. He would be high up on a list of players that could go to an extended fall league season. That is, if such a thing comes to fruition. Hopefully he will get that chance.
Photo credit: Sean Williams/FutureSox
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Jake Burger, Micker Adolfo are probably the 2 most hurt by the canceled season. I really hope they have some kind of fall/winter league. Also, if they lose Great Falls then I would like to see rookie ball go full season.
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