It figured that Carlos Rodon’s return to the White Sox would come this weekend, and it now officially will.
The White Sox activated Rodon from the 60-day disabled list Saturday and announced that he will make his season debut as the starting pitcher in Saturday’s game against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park.
Rodon has been on the shelf since September, when he had shoulder surgery to fix his second significant arm injury of 2017. The first of those kept him from making his season debut until late June, and he ended up starting just 12 games last season. His season debut this time around comes a tad earlier.
Rodon made four minor league rehab starts with terrific results, posting a 1.53 ERA and striking out 28 hitters in 17.2 innings. While obviously the competition will be much greater at the big league level, those results are another example of the flashes of brilliance that Rodon has shown, when healthy, since the White Sox spent the No. 3 pick in the 2014 draft on the left-hander.
Even during his brief campaign in 2017, he posted three double-digit strikeout games, including 11-strikeout efforts against both the Cubs and Red Sox. He had a five-start stretch during which he had a 2.25 ERA and 37 strikeouts in 36 innings.
But health has been a concern for Rodon, and the remainder of the 2018 campaign will be of the “prove it” variety as he looks to show that he can stay on the field. While the rebuilding White Sox are far from contention at the moment, the stakes still remain high for Rodon as the starting-pitching competition has intensified around him. The battle for the five spots in the team’s rotation of the future is a crowded one featuring Rodon, Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez, Michael Kopech, Alec Hansen, Dane Dunning and Dylan Cease, among others.
The work of showing he deserves to stay in that conversation begins with his first outing of 2018 on Saturday.