Baseball roundup: White does well, but returns to minors
Published 1:38 pm Friday, June 20, 2025
- Cobb Hightower (East Rowan) and proud family
From staff reports
CHICAGO — Owen White pitched well on Thursday for the Chicago White Sox, but his reward was being shipped back to the Charlotte Knights not long after the game.
It was the second game of a doubleheader, and White entered in the sixth inning with the White Sox trailing 6-1. He pitched a scoreless sixth and put up another zero in the seventh before the White Sox scored five times in the bottom of the seventh for a 6-all tie.
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White went back to the mound for the eighth and got a strikeout, but after a walk and a double, he was replaced.
The game went extra innings, with the Cardinals winning 8-6.
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Cobb Hightower (East Rowan) missed almost three weeks of action with a knee issue, but the third-round draft pick has returned to the lineup for the Lake Elsinore Storm, a San Diego farm team.
Hightower is 2-for-8 in three games since returning.
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Vance Honeycutt (Salisbury, UNC), a first-round pick by the Baltimore Orioles last summer, is still struggling offensively in advance Class A ball in Aberdeen, Maryland. His batting average is down to .195 and he’s struck out 90 times in 55 games.
The positives are 33 walks, 29 runs scored and 19 steals.
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Austin Love (West Rowan, UNC) is still rolling as a relief pitcher for the Springfield Cardinals. Love is 3-0 with one save in 16 outings and his ERA is down to 2.42.
He’s struck out 23 in 22.1 innings.
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Former Davie star Carson Whisenhunt could get a chance in the majors soon with San Francisco.
Whisenhunt is 7-4 in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League with a 4.10 ERA (it’s an offensive league). He has 71 strikeouts and only 18 walks in 79 innings.
Whisenhunt, a 24-year-old lefty, was a second-rounder in 2022 and pitched collegiately at East Carolina.
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Catawba placed five on the All-Region Defensive Team, with second baseman Ty Hubbard (South Rowan), shortstop Nathan Chrismon (South Rowan), outfielder Dylan Driver (Carson), pitcher Payne Stolsworth (West Rowan) and third baseman Cole Hales (Carson) honored.
Hubbard is playing for the Thomasville Hi-Toms of the Coastal Plain League this summer, while Chrismon is playing for the Asheboro Copperheads.
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Surry Community College outfielder Elijah Palmer (West Rowan) was a Gold Glove winner for D3 junior colleges and a second team All-America as a sophomore. He signed with St. Bonaventure.
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Duke announced the hiring of Corey Muscara as its next head baseball coach.
Muscara was the pitching coach at Wake Forest.
Muscara replaces Chris Pollard, who departed from Duke earlier this month to become the head coach at Virginia.
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PHOENIX — The MLB Draft Combine gives high school and college players alike opportunities to impress all 30 teams in a variety of ways. Some just come to get their medicals done and have face-to-face meetings with front-office decision-makers. Many take advantage of the chance to provide glimpses of what they can do on the field, albeit in a controlled environment.
CJ Gray (A.L. Brown, N.C. State signee) was a Day 1 standout. Gray displayed a power sinker that he got to the plate at over 96 mph.
Also participating in the Combine are outfielder Kane Kepley (South Rowan, Liberty, UNC) and recent Davie graduate Coy James, who was rated by many as North Carolina’s top high school player in the Class of 2025.
