White Sox Minor League Update: April 20, 2025

All four teams lost, from a slugfest in Charlotte to an extra-inning loss in Birmingham

Nashville Sounds 14, Charlotte Knights 11 (Gameday box) (Statcast box)
It was a slugfest in Charlotte (7-14) on Sunday to cap off the series against the Sounds (12-8) — with 13 home runs blasted between both teams. Nashville, after getting off to a huge early lead, held on to win the game, 14-11.

The Sounds wasted no time teeing off on Knights starter, Chris Rodriguez. The first six Nashville batters ended up scoring off of a walk, a single, and four extra-base hits. Three of those were home runs, including back-to-back jacks before the Knights decided that it was time to pull Rodriguez, who earned the loss and is now 0-3 on the year.

Trey McGough was able to finally get out of the first, but he was also off his game. He gave up one homer in the second to give Nashville their seventh run of the game, and then two more home runs in the third to really throw salt in the wound and put the Sounds up, 12-1.

The Knights didn’t back down, and Brandon Drury had already hit a solo shot back in the first, showing small signs of life for the offense. The home run switch flipped back to Charlotte in the bottom of the fourth, as Kyle Teel kicked off a back-to-back-to-BACK homer spree alongside Colson Montgomery and Tristan Gray to cut the lead down a bit, to 12-4. Montgomery is currently on a six-game hitting streak after slumping to start the year. He’s still striking out at a high rate, but is clearly seeing the ball a lot better.

The Sounds got one more back in the top of the sixth. And yep, you guessed it! It was on yet another solo bomb, given up by Adisyn Coffey — who otherwise had a pretty solid two-inning outing outside of that pitch. Charlotte rebounded in the bottom half of the sixth with a Greg Jones two-run shot — the 12th of the day, for those keeping score at home.

The Sounds helped the Knights get another three back in the seventh, after an error led to three unearned runs to make it 13-9, Nashville. Knights righthander Dan Altavilla allowed the 14th and final run for the Sounds in the top of the ninth — the fourth pitcher for the Good Guys to give up a run Sunday ... yet the only one of the four to not give up a home run. Strange day all around.

Let it be known that there were 3 1⁄3 innings in which the Sounds did not score a run, thanks to solid bullpen work from James Karinchak, Justin Anderson, and Caleb Freeman. These three gave up zero hits, one walk, and combined for five of the 11 strikeouts from Charlotte pitchers.

The Knights showed a little bit of fight in their final at-bats, with Dominic Fletcher posting the final homer of the game — a two-run shot — but they weren’t able to complete the comeback.

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Biloxi Shuckers 5, Birmingham Barons 3 (11 innings) (Gameday box)
Birmingham (7-7) scored first with three runs scored in the third, though only one was earned due to a fielding error from the Shuckers (6-9). The issue is that the Barons never scored again after that, and only had four hits the entire game compared to Biloxi’s 10. The three runs were enough to provide run support for Wikelman González, but the bullpen wasn’t able to hold the lead and the Barons dropped a tough one in 11 innings to lose the series.

González gave up just two hits in his five scoreless innings, though he struggled a bit with control as he walked four batters. He still struck out eight and looked really good outside of the walks, if Wikelman can cut those down, he could really be a dangerous piece to the rotation.

Jake Palisch came in for González and gave up two runs on six hits to bring the Shuckers within one, but Barons third baseman Jason Matthews likely saved the game by snagging a line drive double play to end the inning.

Jarold Rosado made his fifth appearance of the year, and as soon as he entered the game for Palisch, he threw a wild pitch before striking out the next batter to end the eighth. Rosado ended up blowing the save in the ninth, however, allowing the tying run to score after a single and three consecutive walks to send the Shuckers to extras.

The 10th inning was smooth for Birmingham righty Tyler Davis, getting out of the jam with the ghost runner at second. Biloxi scored the go-ahead run in the 11th on an RBI triple, and a passed ball from Adam Hackenberg brought in the fifth run for the Shuckers.

For some odd reason, infielder Shawn Goosenberg made an appearance out of ... the bullpen? I’m not sure if the white flag was being waved or if the rest of the bullpen suddenly disappeared, especially weird given tomorrow is an off-day. But he was put in after Davis walked a batter with two outs. Goosenberg hit a batter before getting the final out. For reference, Goosenberg had pitched one career inning, and typically plays the first or is a DH, so he’s no secret, two-way player.

The Barons were not able to answer back, and lost a heartbreaker in 11 to drop them to .500 on the year. Guess it didn’t really matter who pitched, did it?!

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Greenville Drive 8, Winston-Salem Dash 7 (12 innings) (Gameday box)
Looking at the box score, the game was fairly even across the board with Greenville (7-7) just out-scoring and out-hitting Winston-Salem (5-10), who came up short in the ninth to lose their third game in a row and the series.

The Dash offense was movin’ and groovin’ in the first half of the game, with two runs apiece in the third, fourth, and fifth innings to give starter Seth Keener, a six-run cushion. Keener was solid through three scoreless innings before giving up a two-run shot in the fourth. But it was the fifth that really went off the rails. Connery Peters came in to relieve and gave up two runs that were charged to Keener, but also gave up a three-run shot to put the Drive ahead 7-6. Just brutal.

Joseph Yabbour allowed the eighth and final run for the Drive in the bottom of the seventh after walking the first batter he faced, who then stole second and reached third on the same play due to a throwing error. That same batter scored on a wild pitch, so Winston-Salem essentially handed them a run.

The Dash tried to rally in the top of the ninth, and were able to get one back on a Caden Connor RBI single, but weren’t able to tie it up.

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Columbia Fireflies 4, Kannapolis Cannon Ballers 3 (Gameday box)
For the fourth loss of the White Sox farm, the Cannon Ballers (7-8) dropped the series to the Columbia Fireflies (9-6) after righty reliever Carlton Perkins gave up a go-ahead home run in the top of the eighth. Nick Pinto was solid in his six-inning start, giving up three runs (two earned) on five hits, while walking one and racking up six Ks. The unearned run was due to a throwing error by shortstop Javier Mogollón, and unfortunately ended up hurting quite a bit.

Outside of Perkins earning the L, the bullpen was reliable with Jonathan Clark and Morris Austin combining to give up two hits and two strikeouts. On the other side of the ball, the bats were working, putting up eight hits as a team. Outside of the error, Mogollón also accounted for two of the three RBIs on Sunday, so he definitely tried to make up for it. Kannapolis went 2-for-8 with RISP, which wouldn’t be horrible if they also didn’t leave eight runs floating around on the bases, yearning to be scored.

There wasn’t much fight put up in the ninth by the Ballers. Caleb Bonemer drew a walk — his third of the day — but they weren’t able to make it happen.