Don Cooper, the longtime White Sox pitching coach who helped shape one of the club’s most successful eras, has died at 70. A family announcement on social media reported his death, and the White Sox later confirmed it.
Cooper had been with the organization since 1988, first coaching at the White Sox’ Single-A affiliate before replacing Nardi Contreras as the major-league pitching coach in July 2002. He held that job through the 2020 season, spending more than 18 years on the major-league staff and more than three decades in the organization overall.
That long run is part of why his name still carries weight around the White Sox. During Cooper’s tenure, Esteban Loaiza finished second in Cy Young voting in 2003, Chris Sale piled up five straight All-Star appearances in a White Sox uniform, and Mark Buehrle delivered a no-hitter in 2007 and a perfect game in 2009. Buehrle, Jose Contreras, John Garland and Freddy Garcia also closed out the 2005 American League Championship Series with four straight complete games, a feat no MLB team has matched since 1928. White Sox pitchers from 2003 to 2020 ranked fourth in MLB in wins above replacement, according to FanGraphs.
But Cooper’s career with the club ended the same way it began, inside a system that valued results but never stopped demanding them. He was celebrated for helping build a dominant rotation and for the confidence he gave pitchers, yet he was also fired alongside Rick Renteria after the shortened 2020 campaign. That mixture of achievement and abrupt exit is part of the final chapter now attached to his name.
The cause of death was not announced. For the White Sox, Cooper’s death closes the book on one of the most durable coaching figures in team history, and the unanswered question is no longer what he meant to the organization, but how the people who worked with him will remember the voice that steadied so many of their best years.
