White Sox September Call-Ups 2026: Who Comes Up, and Why It’s Different This Year

SWN Analysis · August 26, 2026

Rosters expand from 26 to 28 players on Sept. 1. Stats current as of Aug. 26, 2026.

For three straight seasons, September on the South Side was an audition. With 100-loss campaigns already decided, the White Sox used the expanded roster to hand debuts to prospects and take flyers on upside. Sean Burke and Jairo Iriarte debuted in September 2024. Bryan Ramos got another look in 2025. Luis Patiño got a chance in 2023.

That was the right approach for a losing team. It is not the approach for this one.

Chicago is 69-63 and leading the AL Central by 2.5 games with Cleveland surging. The two extra roster spots on Sept. 1 are win-now spots. Here’s who’s most likely to fill them.

The rotation help

Drew Thorpe, RHP — Triple-A Charlotte

The case: The most impactful available arm, and he’s ready.

Thorpe has been on a rehab assignment working back from Tommy John surgery, and his last two outings at Charlotte produced three earned runs over 10 innings with 12 strikeouts. More telling than the line: he threw 83 pitches in his most recent start, which is a full starter’s workload.

Playing time projection: A permanent rotation spot for the final month. The cleanest version of this move pushes Erick Fedde or José Urquidy into a multi-inning relief role, which upgrades two spots at once — a better starter in the rotation and a length arm in a bullpen that has been leaned on hard.

40-man status: Already rostered.

David Sandlin, RHP — Triple-A Charlotte

The case: The alternative if Thorpe isn’t fully built up, and a useful arm regardless.

Sandlin came over from Boston in the February Jordan Hicks salary dump and has been steady in the Charlotte rotation, posting an ERA in the low 2s. His strikeout rate has dipped as the organization works on his mechanics and command, but the run prevention has been there. He already has big-league time — his debut on May 28 included retiring 18 straight after a leadoff home run.

Playing time projection: Rotation depth or long relief. Mid-rotation ceiling long term, with a leverage-reliever fallback.

40-man status: Already rostered — which matters more than it sounds like in a September where roster spots are tight.

The bullpen depth

Jairo Iriarte, RHP — Triple-A Charlotte

The case: One of the biggest bounce-back seasons in the entire system.

Iriarte came over as a key piece of the Dylan Cease trade and reached the majors in 2024, then had a genuinely disastrous 2025 — a 7.13 ERA across 48 innings with 37 walks. He has rebuilt himself at Charlotte this year.

Playing time projection: Low-leverage innings at first, with a path to more if the command holds. A September look also informs whether he’s part of the 2027 bullpen plan.

The bench bat

Ryan Galanie, 1B — Triple-A Charlotte

The case: A left-handed power bat on a roster that could use one.

Galanie was a 23-year-old 13th-round pick in 2023 and has slugged his way to Triple-A, putting together his best professional season: .283/.358/.536 with an .894 OPS across 96 games, starting 71 of them at first base for Charlotte.

Playing time projection: Limited. There aren’t regular at-bats available for him, and this would be a bench role — a pinch-hit option against right-handed pitching. The argument for it is that Charlotte’s depth is thin and the 26-year-old has earned a look.

The wave that already arrived

Part of what makes this September different is that most of the prospect promotions already happened, and they happened because the team needed them, not because the calendar said so.

Hagen Smith, the fifth overall pick in the 2024 draft, and Tanner McDougal, a 2021 fifth-rounder, both debuted three weeks ago when the bullpen was depleted. Smith had a 4.32 ERA over 20 appearances at Charlotte (14 of them starts) before the organization moved him to relief to prep him for the majors; McDougal posted a 2.86 ERA in 15 appearances. Both have since pitched meaningful innings, including bridging to the ninth in the sweep at Detroit.

Tyler Schweitzer earned his debut and has bounced between Charlotte and the active roster as a long reliever — not high leverage, but valuable innings-eating.

Sam Antonacci and Braden Montgomery, the system’s top position-player prospects, are contributing at the major league level.

Still at Triple-A, probably staying there

Noah Schultz, LHP (MLB No. 47 prospect) has been up and down as a starter at Charlotte this season. He was expected to debut in 2026 and still might — but handing meaningful September innings in a division race to an inconsistent 22-year-old is a different proposition than doing it in a lost season.

Jacob Gonzalez, IF has power (15 home runs in his first 46 games at Charlotte) without an obvious lineup path.

William Bergolla Jr., IF led the full-season minors in strikeout rate in 2025 at 4.7% — an elite contact profile that’s more of a 2027 story.

The bottom line

Two spots, and the sensible use of both is pitching: Thorpe into the rotation, with Sandlin or Iriarte as the second arm. Galanie is the position-player case, and it’s a bench case.

The White Sox got here by trusting young players. The difference in September 2026 is that they’re being called up to win games, not to see what they’ve got.

One more September note: Tim Anderson, who announced his retirement from MLB, will be honored by the White Sox on Sept. 17.

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