It's weird to think of a season in which a team loses 102 games as "progress", but the 2025 Chicago White Sox were no ordinary team.
Coming off the heels of an historically bad campaign in 2024, the White Sox were never expected to be good this season. Still, they improved on last season's record by 19 games, and a number of notable players emerged as obvious keepers through this current rebuild.
Top prospects Kyle Teel and Colson Montgomery made their respective MLB debuts, and it's hard to imagine that it could have gone better for either player. Both rookies finished atop the White Sox in fWAR (1.9 for Teel, 2.7 for Montgomery), while the catcher posted a 125 wRC+ and Montgomery followed suit with a 129 wRC+.
On the pitching side of things, Shane Smith, Sean Burke, and Davis Martin all had strong campaigns atop the rotation and appear to be ready to lead the next wave of starting pitchers on the South Side of Chicago.
However, it was the debut and steady play of Chase Meidroth that registers as the most welcome surprise for the White Sox, mostly thanks to his versatility and advanced plate approach.
Chase Meidroth's underrated MLB debut gives White Sox another building block
For as great as Teel and Montgomery were in 2025, both rookies struck out an alarming amount of the time—Teel struck out at a 25.9% rate, while Montgomery was punched out in 29.2% of his plate appearances.
On the other hand, Meidroth's strikeout rate sat at just 14.3% for his rookie campaign, which looks peachy compared to his solid 8.9% walk rate.
While he had his ups and downs -- as is the case for every rookie -- Meidroth was remarkably consistent throughout the 2025 season. His wRC+ hovered between 80 and 100 in every month of the season besides July, and his strikeout rate never eclipsed peaked beyond his June mark of 17.3%.
Chase Meidroth slugs a leadoff homer 😤 pic.twitter.com/vKpw4g4x57
— MLB (@MLB) July 25, 2025
To be sure, those aren't excellent numbers. His final tally of five home runs, 14 stolen bases, a .649 OPS and an 87 wRC+ aren't exactly anything to write home about. However, in conjunction with his strong glove at both second base and shortstop (one FRV at second, three FRV at short), he was worth 1.3 fWAR this season, a more-than-acceptable mark for a 23-year-old rookie.
In effect, Meidroth already is the player Nick Madrigal was always supposed to become. That's not the kind of revelatory find that will change a franchise's fortunes, but Meidroth is the kind of player all winning franchises have. If nothing else, that's a step in the right direction for the White Sox.