2 dominant, left-handed White Sox pitching prospects earn minor league promotions

There are a lot of big name pitching prospects in the Chicago White Sox farm system, especially when it comes to left-handers.

Noah Schultz and Hagen Smith were both former first-round draft picks that have been ranked as the best left-handed pitchers in all of the minor leagues on MLB.com's Top 100 prospects list.

Developing in the organization that brought up Garrett Crochet, Chris Sale, and Carlos Rodon certainly bodes well for both Schultz and Smith. The White Sox seem to know a thing or two about left-handed pitching.

Even if we were to go a little deeper than the biggest names in the system, the Chicago White Sox have some other dominant left-handed pitching prospects that recently earned promotions of their own in the minor leagues.

Shane Murphy is having a season unlike anything I’ve ever seen. He had been flirting with history in the Southern League while pitching for the Birmingham Barons.

Grant Umberger, on the other hand, is an undrafted free agent that’s making a big name for himself.

Shane Murphy's great season is rewarded with Triple-A promotion

What more can be said about Shane Murphy and his 2025 season? The 24-year-old lefty got his first taste of Double-A just a few weeks into the minor league season.

Upon that promotion, Murphy has been lights out. In 20 outings for Birmingham, Murphy had an outstanding 1.38 ERA. In 110.2 innings pitched, he had only struck out 82 batters. That’s not surprising for a guy that relies on soft contact to get outs. That being said, a 0.83 WHIP speaks to just how dominant Murphy was every time he took the mound.

With Murphy having a borderline historic season at 24 years old, I have been an advocate for giving him a shot in the big leagues during the month of September. If we are to assume that Shane Murphy is in the mix to be part of the White Sox starting rotation in 2026, the next few weeks would be a good chance for him to audition and get a taste of facing Major League batters.

The White Sox have been willing to promote straight from Double-A in the past, but with Murphy, they decided that some time in Charlotte was necessary.

Murphy was promoted to join Triple-A Charlotte this week and he made his first start for the Knights on Thursday. In five innings of work, Murphy gave up two runs, four hits, and struck out four (5 IP, 2 ER, 4 H, 4 K). It was a very solid International League debut, unfortunately, for him, Charlotte didn’t give him much run support, and he was saddled with the loss.

Even if it’s not the big leagues, it’s nice to see Murphy get a well-earned promotion. Hopefully, he continues his dominance in Triple-A and can make that anticipated MLB debut before too much longer. I’m really excited about what he could bring to the White Sox rebuild.

Grant Umberger is making a name for himself

Grant Umberger is another left-handed pitcher in the White Sox organization, but he has an even lower profile than Murphy.

Umberger struggled through three seasons of college baseball at Virginia Tech before transferring to Toledo for his senior season. As a converted starter for Toledo, Umberger posted a respectable 3.81 ERA in 2024. That still wasn’t good enough for him to get on the radar of pro teams before the 2024 MLB Draft.

Umberger went undrafted, then played out the rest of his summer for a team called the Mahoning Valley Scrappers of the MLB Draft League. His performance in that league was enough to get Umberger on the White Sox radar. This February, the White Sox signed him to a minor league contract.

Since being assigned to Low-A Kannapolis by the White Sox in April, Grant Umberger has done nothing but produce. In 102 innings with Kannapolis, Umberger went to 9-2 with a 2.56 ERA. He also has 113 strikeouts and allowed an opposing batting average of .223.

At the start of September, Umberger got his first promotion. He’s heading to High-A to join the Winston-Salem Dash for the rest of the 2025 season.

Umberger will turn 24 next month, which is on the older side for a pitcher in Winston-Salem, but the aforementioned Shane Murphy is a perfect example of how quickly someone can rise through the minor leagues with a strong season.

Murphy is 24, and he began the year in Winston-Salem. Now he’s getting buzz for an MLB call-up. If Umberger keeps pitching like he has up to this point in his professional career, he’ll quickly go from an overachieving undrafted free agent to fast-rising future asset.

Due to their age, neither one of these guys are featured on White Sox Top 30 prospect lists, but both deserve recognition for how well they’ve pitched in 2025 and what they could possibly bring to the organization down the line.