White Sox Impressed By Grant Taylor, Exercising Caution Due To Injury History

Right-hander Grant Taylor was named Chicago White Sox minor league pitcher of the month for March and April. In his first four appearances, he allowed just one earned run in 11.1 innings with the Double-A Birmingham Barons.

The White Sox selected Taylor in the second round of the 2023 MLB Draft out of LSU, and he's the organization's No. 7 prospect, per MLB Pipeline's rankings.

Taylor boasts a fastball in the upper 90s, along with a cutter, curveball, slider and a newly developed changeup. That repertoire has helped him strike out 16 batters this season while posting a 1.11 WHIP.

"Turns out he's got decent stuff," White Sox director of player development Paul Janish said Saturday, smiling. "Grant's been good."

Grant Taylor lowers his ERA to 1.08🔥

The @WhiteSox No. 7 prospect spins three hitless frames with 5 K's for the Double-A @BhamBarons. pic.twitter.com/Z8W5YupiG8
— MLB Pipeline (@MLBPipeline) April 23, 2025

The 6-foot-3, 22-year-old hasn't allowed more than two hits in any start this season, good for just six hits in 14.1 innings. Where he can run into issues, though, is with command, seen through his 10 walks. But for Janish, Taylor's swing-and-miss stuff and ability to induce weak contact can outweigh the walks.

"The stuff, when he's in the zone, has proven it's going to play, right," Janish said. "Even at the Double-A level, he's had a couple of instances where he's been out of the zone and walked some guys relative to the amount of innings he's pitched. But he's always going to have the blessing of being able to get himself out of jams, which he's done up to this point this year."

There's obvious upside with Taylor, but the White Sox are being careful with his workload and how quickly he may climb the minor league ranks.

Taylor pitched 31 innings for LSU during the 2022 season, primarily as a reliever. Shortly before the 2023 season, he suffered an elbow injury that required him to missed the entire season and undergo Tommy John surgery. He was limited to 16 innings with Single-A Kannapolis last season due to a lat injury.

He's off to a strong start in Double-A this year, but he hasn't thrown more than three innings or 59 pitches in a single start so far. In his most recent outing on Saturday, Taylor threw three scoreless innings with two hits, two strikeouts and zero walks in 46 pitches, lowering his ERA to 0.63.

"We obviously are going to exercise caution with him from a workload standpoint," Janish said. "Just because of his injury history and just because of the desire to get him through this year completely healthy is really the most important thing."

Taylor, along with White Sox No. 1 prospect Noah Schultz and No. 3 prospect Hagen Smith, make for quite the trio of pitchers in Birmingham. The White Sox are intrigued by Taylor's arsenal of pitches, but they also like his mentality on the mound.

"He's in a good spot, man," Janish said. "I've said it about Grant before and I'll continue to say it, he really, really likes to be in the fire, meaning he's a competitor and he wants to be on the mound. It's fun to watch him and the biggest thing for us with him is just monitoring the workload and just making sure that from a recovery standpoint in between his outings, he's on a really good routine schedule to try to give himself the best chance to stay healthy."

Related stories on the Chicago White Sox