The White Sox made an surprising roster move shortly before Saturday's winner against Oakland, recalling Ky Bush from Triple-A Charlotte, but placing him on the 15-day injured list with a left triceps strain.
The latter part isn't the surprise, unfortunately, as Bush had been dealing with flagging velocity for his last several starts. The hope was that it was entirely due to a career-high workload of 124 innings.
And perhaps it still is. As Ethan Hullihen pointed out on Twitter, the White Sox optioned Bush to Charlotte 19 days ago, which means that if he spends the rest of the season on the MLB roster in any capacity -- even injured list -- the White Sox can avoid using one of his options, because a player has to spend 20 days in the minors after an option for it to count.
That makes more sense than the other issue that could force such a maneuver, which is that Bush actually got injured while with the White Sox. Had he started one game with Charlotte and didn't look right, there might be a stronger case. The specific timing gives the option-based reason more weight, especially if they were planning on shutting him down for the season regardless.
Bush finishes his minor-league season with a 3.30 ERA and 100 strikeouts against 46 walks and nine homers allowed over 106⅓ innings, along with a rockier 17⅔ innings over four starts with Chicago.
Charlotte 10, Jacksonville 2 (Game 1, 7 innings)
- Yoán Moncada singled, walked twice and struck out once.
- Tim Elko went 1-for-3 with a walk.
- Colson Montgomery, 0-for-4.
- Oscar Colás was 2-for-4 with a strikeout and a stolen base.
- Michael Soroka: 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K
- Steven Wilson: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K
Notes:
*Soroka is 3-0 with Charlotte after opening the year 0-10 with the White Sox.
Jacksonville 2, Charlotte 0 (Game 2, 7 innings)
- Oscar Colás went 0-for-3 with a K.
- Tim Elko, 1-for-2 with a walk.
- Colson Montgomery went 1-for-3 with a double.
- Shane Murphy fared better in Triple-A emergency duty this time around: 3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K, 32 of 47 pitches for strikes.
- Nick Nastrini: 2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K, 25 of 40 pitches for strikes.
Tennessee 2, Birmingham 0
- Rikuu Nishida went 1-for-4.
- DJ Gladney, 0-for-4.
- Terrell Tatum, 1-for-4 with two strikeouts.
- Noah Schultz: 4 IP, 8 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, 40 of 60 pitches for strikes.
- Peyton Pallette: 1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 1 K, 15 of 31 pitches for strikes.
