Chicago White Sox Send Starting Pitcher Down To Minor Leagues

CHICAGO –– After giving up 18 earned runs over his last three starts, the White Sox decided it was time to make a change with Jonathan Cannon.

Ahead of Friday's series opener against the Cleveland Guardians at 6:40 p.m. CT at Rate Field, the team optioned Cannon, 25, to Triple-A Charlotte and recalled rookie right-hander Wikelman Gonzalez. When Cannon's spot in the rotation comes up next, manager Will Venable said left-hander Tyler Alexander will serve a bulk role, whether it be starting the game or coming out of the bullpen.

"We felt like it was a good time to give him a breather," general manager Chris Getz said Friday. "He’d been fighting himself a little bit, searching, so we view it as an opportunity to get his confidence back. He’s a guy that needs to attack the zone. He’s got an ability to get quick early contact, but he kind of got away from that approach."

"His pitch counts were getting high. He wasn’t as productive, so we’ve got some things to work on. Is that the first guy to have been optioned? He’s still very early in his career and we believe him and we’ve seen an extended period of time being a successful starter, so he needs to go down there and get to work and I’m sure he’ll be back here before he knows it."

Through 19 appearances and 17 starts in his second major league season, Cannon had a 5.34 ERA and a 1.45 WHIP with 35 walks and 76 strikeouts across 96 innings. He recorded five quality starts, including a streak of four in a row from April 26 to May 13 against the Athletics, Astros, Royals and Reds.

Cannon's fifth quality start came on July 18 in Pittsburgh, a seven-inning outing with just one earned run. But immediately thereafter, he was roughed up in three straight starts. The Tampa Bay Rays racked up five runs in 4.1 innings. The Phillies scored six runs in six innings against him. And in his shortest start of the season on Wednesday, just 1.2 innings, Cannon allowed seven runs.

Cannon missed almost the entire month of June due to a lower back strain. While there has not necessarily been an indication that his struggles are injury-related, there's a physical element to the adjustments the White Sox want him to make.

"He’s been fighting his delivery. How related is that to his back injury? I don't know. He is healthy, says he’s healthy, you look at the strength testing, the mobility when he’s with the trainers and strength coaches," Getz said. "When it comes to pitching, you can have an idea of where you want to take the ball, but if your body is not getting in line to do that you’re going to have your struggles."

"Once again, getting him in an environment where he can slow down a little bit, find himself, have some really quality side sessions, not be so reliant on immediate results. Because at the major league level you want to produce and produce right away. We can get to work and once again continue to build him back up."

The situation with Cannon is somewhat similar to an approach the White Sox took with Colson Montgomery earlier in the season. Montgomery had been struggling at Triple-A, so they sent him to Arizona to make adjustments and mentally reset. Now with the big-league club, he has eight home runs since the All-Star break.

It's different in the sense that Cannon is a pitcher going from the majors to Triple-A, but there are a few parallels.

"In a way it’s a chance for Jonathan to take a deep breath and then find yourself," Getz said. "It’s really hard at the major league level when you start searching. When you go down to Triple-A the game slows down, so it’s a different pace to it and oftentimes you can just lose yourself at the major league level, where you go back down and ‘Oh, this is what I can do. I can land this pitch and attack hitters this way.’ So I hope he views it as an opportunity. I know he was disappointed, but he understood. We still believe in him of course, like we believe in so many of our players. And that's why we made the move. We know there’s a better version of Jonathan Cannon than what we’ve seen here recently."

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