Two summers ago, right-hander Jonathan Cannon’s first game throwing to Edgar Quero was a good one.
Now a starting pitcher for the big-league White Sox, Cannon held the opposition to one run in five innings for Double-A Birmingham that day, allowing only three hits.
Quero, then a 20-year-old catcher ranked among baseball’s top 100 prospects, had just come over in a trade with the Angels, part of a deadline sell-off setting the stage for a new Sox rebuild.
The two are teammates again, the Sox in the thick of that rebuild but with the future beginning to arrive in the majors. Quero’s call-up has been one of the brightest spots in a season that has started much like the last, which ended with a record-setting 121 losses.
With the organization’s focus squarely on development, signs of progress are far more important than nightly results.
And for one observer, Quero’s maturation is a massive step in the right direction.
“He’s come such a long way from Birmingham,” Cannon told the Sun-Times on Sunday. “Everyone can see that, inside the [organization] and out, just the development. Everyone knew he was going to be a good hitter, but the defense has really come a long, long way.
“He’s just very comfortable behind the plate. And the pitch-calling continues to get better and better each game. . . . He’s definitely come a long way already.
“Seeing the development he’s done from the last time I saw him in Birmingham to now here, he’s an entirely different player.”
Quero has impressed fans with what he has done at the plate and impressed the team with what he has done behind it. He was one of the younger players at pretty much every level in the minors, and he made his big-league debut only 11 days after his 22nd birthday.
Certainly, no one was expecting a finished product after a few weeks in the majors. But Quero continues to earn plaudits from everyone in the organization.
“Edgar’s done a really nice job here,” Sox bench coach Walker McKinven said. “I’m really, really proud of the way he’s handled all this. We throw a lot of stuff on him, from game-planning to receiving to controlling the running game. And then we ask him to hit fourth for us. It’s a lot of things for a young player to have on his plate.
“He’s a really great communicator, an awesome kid that connects around the clubhouse. It seems like he’s friends with everyone. I always see him chatting with dudes. But he’s also very, very open, very receptive. . . . He’s willing to do anything, try anything, listen to anyone.”
Of course, Quero’s not alone when it comes to future Sox backstops.
The team acquired another top-100 catching prospect over the winter: Kyle Teel, the headliner of the return in the Garrett Crochet trade. Teel is off to a nice start, if not an eye-popping one, at Triple-A Charlotte, coming into Sunday with a .260 batting average, a .350 on-base percentage and four home runs in 33 games.
“We’re really fortunate to have two high-end talents at that position,” McKinven said. “It’s obviously an important position, the conductor to a lot of things on the field for us. So to have two young players oozing with talent at that position is really a good spot to be in.
“Both those dudes, different players but both young. And the catcher position is one of responsibility, and we ask a lot of them, so it is a continual process to grow at that position. We stuffed them both with a ton of information. . . . Edgar’s here first, but we’re excited about Kyle and constantly monitoring how Kyle’s doing there.”
The Sox obviously will welcome the problems of figuring out which of the two will dominate catching duties and how to get both in the lineup at the same time. Those are future concerns.
For now, like with everything for these Sox, it’s about development.