The Chicago White Sox are not done shopping. In the wee hours before Monday's 6 p.m. ET trade deadline, the club acquired hard-throwing right-handed reliever Huascar Brazoban from the New York Mets, sending Double-A right-handers Gabe Davis and Zach Franklin back to Queens. The deal was reported late Sunday night by The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal and MLB.com's Mark Feinsand, giving Chicago another late-inning weapon as general manager Chris Getz pushes to win a division race nobody expected the White Sox to be in.
It was the kind of deal that gets lost in the chaos of deadline weekend, sandwiched between the Tarik Skubal blockbuster to the Dodgers, Kevin Gausman landing with the Cubs, and Luis Garcia Jr. heading to the Yankees. But quiet trades win pennants, and this one might matter more than its billing suggests.
Brazoban to the White Sox: Why Getz Went Back for Bullpen Help
This was not a panic move. It was the next step in a deadline strategy Chicago has been building all week. The White Sox have been baseball's most aggressive buyers, and landing a veteran reliever of Brazoban's caliber for two unranked-level arms is exactly the kind of deal a front office makes when it believes its window is open now. The AL Central race is tight, and Getz has made it clear the organization is no longer operating like a team in a rebuild. Every inning down the stretch matters, and bullpens decide October baseball more than any other unit.
Brazoban gives Chicago exactly what contender bullpens crave: a power arm with late-inning experience who has been throwing some of the best baseball of his career. The price was modest, which is what happens when a seller is more interested in restocking than in maximizing one player's return.
The Mets' Return: Gabe Davis and Zach Franklin Are Two Lottery Tickets
For New York, this is a small piece of a larger sell-off. The Mets already moved starter Freddy Peralta to the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday afternoon, and shipping out Brazoban continues a theme: New York is collecting arms at the lower levels while clearing salary and roles for next season. Gabe Davis, ranked 18th in Chicago's system, is a right-hander with a live arm who has shown enough to be on the fringes of prospect lists, while Zach Franklin is a lottery ticket with reliever traits. Neither is a headline prospect, and the Mets know it. But when a team is out of contention, flipping a rental reliever for two young pitchers is how organizations rebuild depth without spending a dime.
The Mets are banking on volume. Two arms for one veteran rental is the classic seller's math, and if even one of those pitchers develops into a big-league contributor, the trade pays for itself.
What Brazoban Brings to Chicago's Bullpen
Brazoban is not a finesse pitcher. The 36-year-old Dominican righty attacks hitters with a fastball that lives in the upper 90s, and his breaking stuff has been a genuine swing-and-miss weapon this season. He has worked in high-leverage roles before and carries the kind of confidence that plays in September. He will slot into a Chicago bullpen that has been a quiet strength of the club all year, giving manager the flexibility to shorten games once the rotation turns over.
The fit is obvious. Chicago's starters have been good enough to hand leads to the bullpen, and now the back end of the game gets deeper. Brazoban does not have to be the closer. He just has to be the guy who makes the seventh and eighth innings miserable for opposing hitters, and that is a role he has filled effectively for years. He has been there before, too — the veteran has pitched in October and understands that the strike zone shrinks when the games matter most. That experience is a commodity in itself.
The White Sox have spent this deadline adding proven big-league talent, with Luis Castillo earlier in the week serving as the centerpiece, and Brazoban is the kind of complementary piece that quietly wins pennants. Chicago has addressed the rotation, fortified the bullpen, and done it all without touching the top of its farm system. That is how a front office builds a contender without ever saying the word rebuild out loud.
Deadline Aftermath: The AL Central Just Got Harder
Every contender in the AL Central watched this deadline closely, and Chicago's activity has shifted the balance of the division. The White Sox were supposed to be the easy out. Instead, they have added an ace-level starter, a veteran reliever, and done it all without gutting a farm system that still has talent coming. The teams chasing them now have to answer a simple question: are they willing to match a front office that believes in its own timeline?
For bettors, the read is straightforward. Chicago's bullpen just got a high-leverage upgrade at a minimal cost, which should tighten the club's late-game pricing in the weeks ahead. Watch how the White Sox deploy Brazoban in his first week — if he is immediately trusted in save-adjacent situations, that tells you everything about how the organization views this roster right now. The deadline was supposed to belong to the Dodgers and the Yankees. Quietly, the White Sox made it theirs too.
Rebecca Hayes
Rebecca Hayes writes sports features, previews, and event coverage with a focus on the people, trends, and storylines that fans care about.