Former White Sox top prospect has announced retirement

The Chicago White Sox drafted Alex Hansen with their second-round pick in the 2016 MLB Draft. He was a great college pitcher at Oklahoma of the Big 12 and looked like he had a really good chance of being in the White Sox rotation or bullpen one day.

Hansen was as high as the fourth-ranked prospect in the Chicago White Sox organization at one point. He played through the Minor League system but hasn’t been able to crack the AAA roster. He had stints in both low and high A along with some time in AA.

There was no Minor League season in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and he returned to AA in 2021. With the Birmingham Barons, he did not have much success. Unfortunately, he had a 6.04 ERA in 22 games played as a reliever.

He started off as a starter coming out of college but it quickly went off the rails for him. As mentioned before, he didn’t really have much success as a reliever following that. It is a shame that it went this way for him because he did have as bright of a future as anyone.

Alex Hansen of the Chicago White Sox is going to be retiring from baseball.

On Thursday, it came out that Hansen was hanging them up. He retired from the game of baseball which had to be a tremendously hard decision at age 27. We can only hope that this decision is one that he is happy with because the one thing that we all deserve in life is to be happy.

Hansen got to play baseball at a high-profile college and then get drafted by a Major League Baseball organization. He also got to play professional ball for parts of five seasons. He never made his Major League debut but he still has so much to be proud of. He lived a dream that we all wish we could have.

From a business side of things, it is unfortunate but not every big-time prospect is going to work out. With that in mind, the White Sox have done a really good job with their development. Not every player will be Lucas Giolito and turn it around if they struggle at first either.

It isn’t cool to see someone so talented come up just short like that but it happens. Now, the White Sox just have to keep moving forward. Having a good Minor League system is incredibly important to their sustained success. Hopefully, Hansen enjoyed his time.