Grant Taylor has turned into the White Sox’s sharpest postseason weapon, and the numbers are loud: 6⅓ innings, 11 strikeouts, one walk and no earned runs. Chicago’s bullpen has leaned hard on the 24-year-old, and he has answered with the kind of swing-and-miss stuff that changes a game in a hurry.
That is why Taylor is being searched now. The White Sox are two wins from the American League Championship Series, and every inning he throws is starting to carry starter-level weight in the middle of October. He has already reached 90⅓ innings overall this season, past the 85-100 inning target he set at the start of the year, yet he is still the arm Chicago trusts most when the pressure rises.
The praise around him has been immediate. Kyle Teel called it “just unbelievable” and said it was some of the best pitching he has ever seen, adding that Taylor was hitting spots and attacking hitters. Zach Bove pointed to a sinker that gives Taylor a different look and said it throws a wrench in hitters’ plans. On the mound, that has shown up in the simplest way possible: hitters are getting out of his way less often than they are missing his pitches.
Will Venable, though, put the problem in plain language. If Taylor is asked to pitch four innings every game, Venable said, the White Sox will “like, kill him.” That concern is not abstract. Taylor has already had to navigate Tommy John surgery, a lost 2023 while rehabbing, most of 2024 missed with a lat strain, and soreness after starts last year at Double-A Birmingham before Brian Bannister said he was moved to the pen. Bannister has also suggested Taylor’s delivery may place unusual strain on his body.
That is the friction Chicago cannot ignore even while Taylor keeps overpowering hitters. He was not pushed into relief because the White Sox believed he lacked the ability to start. The opposite is true. The question is whether his present role, and the way October is using him, pulls him so far into short-rest dominance that it blurs the line between reliever and starter all over again.
Taylor sounded like someone who understands how quickly the workload can stack up. After he blew out, he said he was told he was going to be Saturday, a reminder that his path has already been altered once before. For the White Sox, the next step is not just whether they advance. It is whether they can keep their most effective arm intact long enough to matter beyond this round.
