DENVER — Colson Montgomery’s roller-coaster season climbed to a new apex in the Mile High City with his major-league debut for the White Sox on the Fourth of July.
And it rose once again with a diving, over-the shoulder catch to save a run early in the Sox’ series opener Friday against the Colorado Rockies.
Not bad for the prized shortstop prospect who has been heralded as a potential franchise cornerstone since being drafted in 2021, but couldn’t crack the Opening Day roster as originally expected.
A nagging back injury and a sluggish bat in spring training gave way to an even worse first month at Triple-A Charlotte for Montgomery, prompting Sox brass to yank him from the field altogether, shipping him to Arizona to get back to the basics working on his swing.
None of that was on the 23-year-old Holland, Indiana, native’s mind evening as he got ready to realize his boyhood dream, running onto Coors Field as a big-leaguer.
Montgomery said he was trying to channel the zen approach that helped him rip four home runs during a 12-for-29 tear over his last seven games at Charlotte to force the Sox’ hand to give him his first taste of the bright lights.
“I just was out there, being free with the boys, hanging out,” Montgomery said in the dugout before his debut. “I was just playing really free, being carefree.”
He got his first defensive putout out of the way to get the Sox’ first out in the bottom of the first, cleanly fielding a 104-mph grounder off the bat of Rockies’ outfielder Tyler Freeman.
His debut would have been memorable enough for the quirkiness of his first plate appearance, when Montgomery worked the count to 3-2 before breaking his bat on a soft grounder — and being granted first base on a catcher’s interference call.
But then the supposedly bat-first shortstop sprinted out to left field to track down a two-out looping fly ball from his Colorado counterpart, Ryan Ritter, with Montgomery making the surefire ESPN web gem of a diving catch to strand a runner at third.
It all marked a full circle back to Denver for Montgomery, who was taken No. 22 by the Sox when the draft was held in the city.
Montgomery was making it look free and easy during his first big-league batting practice session, sending ball after ball through the thin Rocky Mountain air into the evergreens past the 415-feet marker in straight-away center field.
Sox manager Will Venable said he wants to see the 6-foot-3, 230-pound Montgomery bring that punishing pop to an anemic offense.
“He’s been performing very well and hitting the ball extremely hard, so it’s the right time,” Venable said.
But Montgomery knows better than anyone that such streaks can be fleeting. He came back strong from his desert sabbatical in May, but he looked lost at the plate again by mid-June.
“A lot of players don’t wanna say that they’ve struggled, but I’ve gone through some struggles, some ups and downs. And I think that’s just gonna make me a better person and a better player,” Montgomery said. “Now I know what I need to go back to the drawing board.”
Earlier, the Sox shared their latest hidden-camera video of a rookie getting the news from Charlotte manager Sergio Santos breaking the news to Montgomery that he’d be catching a flight to Denver for his first taste of big league action.
It was the first of several tearful conversations Montgomery had in a whirlwind 24 hours that saw his immediate family members scrap vacation plans to get to Denver for his big moment.
For now, he’s focused on that moment — and not the idea of being the face of the Sox’ rebuild.
“To single out one person, that can put a lot of pressure on somebody. I’ve been told that by some people. But there’s more to it than just one guy.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
