GLENDALE, Ariz. — The injury hits just keep on coming for the White Sox farm system.
Word Tuesday that right-hander Dane Dunning is sidelined with forearm discomfort is only the latest in a run of injuries to top Sox prospects. It’s the second already this February — outfielder Luis Basabe broke a hamate bone in his left hand during the first week of spring training. Dunning and Basabe are in the top 10 on most Sox top prospect lists.
Michael Kopech, the Sox’ top pitching prospect and second overall, is out for the season recovering from Tommy John surgery, and the fear exists that Dunning is facing a similar fate.
Dunning left a start for Class AA Birmingham on June 23 and missed the rest of the season with a sprained right elbow. He returned to the mound for the instructional league in October and entered his offseason expecting to be healthy for spring training but was not invited to major league camp after getting an invite last spring.
“I was just kind of praying for the best,” Dunning told reporters in October. “I wasn’t thinking it was surgery, but I put myself in that mind frame that it might be a tear.”
The Sox will have an update on Dunning this week. The 2018 season had way too many such updates for general manager Rick Hahn’s liking, and the rebuilding Sox are off to a bad start in 2019.
Here are the prospects whose development have been stalled by injuries:
*Kopech, Tommy John surgery last September.
*Third baseman Jake Burger (ruptured Achilles), the Sox’ first-round pick in 2017.
*Right-hander Zack Burdi (Tommy John surgery), a first-round pick in 2016.
*Outfielder Luis Robert (sprained thumb).
*Outfielder Micker Adolfo (Tommy John surgery).
*Additionally, right-hander Alec Hansen, a second-round pick ranked among the Sox top prospects a year ago (40th in baseball by Baseball Prospectus) has fallen from those rankings since dealing with forearm and shoulder issues. Outfielder Eloy Jimenez (knee, chest muscle, adductor), the No. 3 prospect in baseball, was slowed by various hurts last season. And outfielder Ryan Cordell, ranked 17th among Sox prospects at the time, suffered a broken clavicle at AAA Charlotte last April.
Dunning was acquired with Lucas Giolito and Reynaldo Lopez in the trade for Adam Eaton, one of the big deals that kicked off the Sox rebuild.
Abreu’s hitting coach
Jose Abreu has kept his personal hitting coach, Marcos Hernandez, nearby, because, as he said through a translator, “you can never know enough about how you can improve your game.”
Abreu said having Hernandez around “is very important to me.”
“It’s like in life, you never know enough about stuff. It’s the same. In this game, especially in the offensive side, you never know enough about the things that you can do and the things you can improve in your game.”
Young Sox
With 20 players under age 26, the White Sox entered spring training with the third youngest 40-man roster in baseball, and youngest in the American League. The average 40-man age is 26 per STATS LLC.
