Brian Bannister on Dylan Cease trade headliners Drew Thorpe and Jairo Iriarte

8:00 AM CDT on April 2, 2024

White Sox pitching prospect Drew Thorpe — Drew Thorpe (Brian Westerholt/Four Seam Images)

When the White Sox traded Dylan Cease for a packaged headline for a pair of prospect arms, it seemed safe to assume that their senior advisor to pitching Brian Bannister had some input and insight on the matter.

"We talked to a lot of teams all offseason, fielded a lot of offers," Bannister told me Saturday morning. "Whether it's what has been reflected in the free agent market in the offseason, I think teams overall were more conservative in all aspects, whether it was [due to] the regional TV [situation] or any other issues."

While this is an atypical opening for talking up the return that the Sox got from the San Diego Padres, atypical is also the standout quality that Bannister touted in new prospect right-handers Drew Thorpe and Jairo Iriarte.

"Pitching sometimes gets oversimplified -- good mechanics, throw hard -- but in this game where we're so saturated in velo, we're looking for outlier, unique qualities," Bannister said. "You're just looking for guys that have the capability to get up to a mid-rotation starter in the big leagues. You're not going to always hit on everybody, but you're looking for guys with those unique characteristics that can allow them to get to that kind of ceiling, and be a very productive pitcher in the big leagues. So, very bullish on both those guys."

Bannister qualified that he and the organization both want to be a little hands-off with new prospects, at least compared to major leaguers and non-roster invites where they need to make changes right away to see the results they envision. In keeping with that, this chat tilted more about what each player brings to the table upon arrival.

Drew Thorpe

That said, Bannister did openly state his belief that Thorpe has a bit more velocity in the tank than the low-90s he's shown, while acknowledging he's flashed the ability to run things up to 93-94 mph at times already.

"I know he gets sick of it, both organizations he's been with have talked about the velo."

The standout quality for Thorpe is both his plus changeup, and also how his changeup winds it way toward being effective. As Bannister explains, the explosion of pitch design and analytical formulas for grading movement quality has slanted the industry toward valuing changeups that display exceptional action, where the value of the pitch is apparent on a movement plot.

Thorpe, with plus command out of a short arm action where his elbow stays closely tucked to his body, has a changeup that gets by on deception and velocity differential from his fastball. It poses a challenge to hitters that is trickier to quantify and appropriately value.

"Most facilities, the Drivelines, the Treads, most team's player development, they tend to focus on the movement of the changeup," Bannister said. "But there are guys with the classic velo differential changeups, but the common attribute tends to be the hidden arm action and he has it."

Bannister spoke generally of wanting to "accentuate his physicality" with Thorpe as they have more pitch design conversations going forward. But he specifically mentioned the importance of adding a true two-seamer with arm side run to Thorpe's arsenal rather than a "sinker." Thorpe has a natural level of cut to his four-seamer that can provide room for right-handed hitters to get their barrel out extended, and Bannister wants him to have another fastball that forces those same righties to tuck their hands in, at least every now and then.

Jairo Iriarte

If Bannister's fatigue with the typical qualities lauded in prospect reports wasn't already plainly spoken, it would be evident in what he highlights about Iriarte.

"Love the hyper-mobility in his delivery," Bannister said. "You see him releasing the ball out there kind of where Zack Wheeler is, somebody like that. Unique approach angles in the zone, big extension, ability to spin the ball."

Iriarte comes with a lot of reliever projections from scouts and an 11.7 percent walk rate across High-A and Double-A last season to testify to it. But Bannister sees the 22-year-old as so raw in his development of an attack plan that looking at those end results is misleading. If anything, Iriarte putting himself on the 40-man roster with his current level of polish is a testament to the pure ability at work in the organization's view.

"Even just initial conversations, didn't really know what his strengths were, didn't really know what his pitches did, very excited to learn. Walk rate is not just the ability to throw pitches in the zone. It's how your pitches play off each other. It's how you affect hitters' swing decision ability and how you can manipulate that.

"There's a lot of things that go into it, and I even remember Logan Webb was a higher walk guy. You get everything dialed in and get it right and you see the walks organically come down. With that confidence comes the strike-throwing ability, the ability to challenge in the zone knowing your stuff is going to play, the pitches are going to visually fool the hitters. There's a lot that goes into it and part of it is just the education side with the pitcher."

Sox Machine has probably already published our share of pieces that conclude with this is a good test case for the team's pitch development under Bannister, but this is probably the more distinct case of the Sox having multiple years to build out an arsenal and approach that works for Iriarte, after paying out the great acquisition cost that is Cease. Chris Flexen, Michael Soroka and even Michael Kopech are all immediately interesting projects, but not really franchise-altering if they fail to produce before their time on the South Side runs out. Iriarte, with intriguing physical tools but enough risk to scare off other clubs from evaluating him this highly, is a real test.

"[Iriarte] can do a lot of things and I don't think he knows how much he can do at the moment," Bannister said. "I'm looking forward to getting some time with him and collaborating with the coaches to really extract the most out of his ability, and mold him into a big league pitcher."

Catching up with Charlotte

With the big league product putting its worst foot forward, you might be jonesing for the Minor Keys to provide some form of comfort. They'll start up when all of the affiliates begin regular season play, so look for the first official installment on Saturday morning.

Charlotte is the only affiliate active for the time being. The Knights opened the season in Memphis this past weekend, and they'll host Norfolk for the season's first six-game series.

Here are the box scores from the past weekend, and we'll roll out another batch of summaries later in the week in anticipation of the White Sox's Double-A and A-ball teams joining the fray.

Friday: Memphis 6, Charlotte 5

Colson Montgomery went 1-for-5 with two strikeouts.
Lenyn Sosa, 2-for-5 with a double and two strikeouts.
Zach DeLoach was 2-for-4.
Oscar Colás went 2-for-3 with a double and a walk, but was caught stealing.
Prelander Berroa: 0.1 IP, 4 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 1 BB, 0 K, 2 HR

Saturday: Memphis 10, Charlotte 3

Colson Montgomery went 1-for-3 with a walk and a strikeout.
Lenyn Sosa, 1-for-4.
Zach DeLoach was 0-for-3 with a walk.
Oscar Colás homered during a 1-for-4 night.
Adam Hackenberg homered, singled and struck out twice.
Jared Shuster, pitching away from Charlotte: 4 IP, 6 H, 7 R, 7 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 4 HR

Notes:

*Montgomery also committed his first error, for those monitoring his defense. He couldn't glove a ball trying to round it off on the backhand side, although an unusual hop on the inner lip of the infield might've interrupted his rhythm and calculations on the angle. As errors go, it's on the more excusable side.