The White Sox have traded outfielder Derek Hill and $250K of international bonus pool space to the Phillies in exchange for outfield prospect Dylan Campbell and infield prospect Jose Colmenares, according to announcements from both clubs. Outfielder Everson Pereira has been reinstated from the injured list to take Hill’s spot on the roster. Philadelphia designated right-hander Jackson Rutledge for assignment to open a 40-man spot for Hill. Jeff Passan of ESPN first reported the trade.
Hill, 30, is a journeyman depth outfielder. This is his seventh big league season but he has appeared in just 268 games in that span. He has suited up for the Tigers, Nationals, Rangers, Giants, Marlins and White Sox. Chicago claimed him off waivers late last season and tendered him an arbitration contract, with the two sides agreeing to a $900K salary for this year.
He’s not much of a threat at the plate. He has a career .227/.278/.351 batting line, which leads to a wRC+ of 74, while striking out at a 30.8% clip. This year’s slash of .213/.284/.375 leads to a slightly better 84 wRC+, but still notably south of league average.
But he has other attributes. He is one of the fastest players in the league, with Statcast putting his sprint speed in the 94th percentile this year. That’s allowed him to steal 30 bases in 39 tries in his career. That speed has also helped him in the field. In over 1500 outfield innings, mostly in center, he has been credited with 11 Outs Above Average. Defensive Runs Saved has considered him to be league average.
Thanks to that speed-and-defense profile, he can be a useful player. The lack of offense hurts but he can at least be a short-side platoon guy. A right-handed swinger, he has a .272/.317/.463 line and 115 wRC+ against lefties, compared to a dismal .195/.251/.271 line and 45 wRC+ in the other split.
Despite his attributes, he has been getting squeezed for playing time in Chicago. The Sox have been calling up rookies this year and have lately been giving most of their outfield playing time to Braden Montgomery, Sam Antonacci, Tristan Peters and Rikuu Nishida, with Hill and Randal Grichuk chipping in from time to time.
The Sox have been rebuilding for years but are having a good season, currently leading the American League Central. This may feel like a “sell” move since they are trading a big leaguer for prospects, but it’s surely more that they feel subtracting Hill doesn’t significantly hurt their chances in 2026. Hill was already losing playing time and Pereira’s return from the IL would have further squeezed him out.
But the Phillies have a far more open outfield mix. They have been giving most of the playing time to Brandon Marsh, Justin Crawford and Adolis García this year, with Edmundo Sosa and Steward Berroa currently in bench roles. Johan Rojas would have been in the mix as a depth option but he was given a PED suspension earlier this year and his comeback was stopped by season-ending elbow surgery this week.
García departed last night’s game after appearing to injure his right shoulder. It’s possible he’s going on the injured list, though Matt Gelb of The Athletic reports that the Phils were looking for a right-handed complement to their outfield even before the García injury.
Marsh and Crawford are both lefty bats. Marsh has a career .221/.284/.318 line against lefties and would ideally have a platoon partner. He has a .288/.333/.442 slash against southpaws this year but that’s getting a lot of help from a .424 batting average on balls in play. Crawford is a rookie with a paltry .232/.291/.332 line on the year, which includes a ghastly .143/.250/.143 line against lefty pitchers.
Between Crawford’s struggles, the platoon issues for both Crawford and Marsh, García’s injury and the Rojas surgery, it’s easy to see how Hill could have a better path to playing time in Philadelphia than he did in Chicago.
To get him aboard, the Phils are parting with a couple of prospects. Campbell, 23, has now twice been traded for pool space. Originally drafted by the Dodgers, that club sent him to the Phillies in January of 2025 to add pool space to help them sign Roki Sasaki. He has played all three outfield positions as well as second base. He’s got some wheels, as he stole 42 bases on the farm in 2024, 33 last year and nine so far in 2026.
His offense is a bit more questionable. He is only hitting .216/.281/.412 at Double-A this year, leading to a wRC+ of just 75. He has been better in the past. He had a combined .232/.314/.370 slash over 2024 and 2025, leading to a league average 100 wRC+. FanGraphs ranked him the #19 prospect in the Philadelphia system in the offseason, though that was before this year’s struggles. He’s not currently listed as a top 30 prospect in the system by either Baseball America or MLB Pipeline.
Colmenares, 24, was originally a Yankee prospect. He was released in August of last year and was signed by the Phillies. He’s having a good season for High-A Jersey Shore, hitting .278/.403/.413, but he’s old for the level and that line is propped up by a .386 BABIP. He has exclusively played shortstop this year but has previous experience at second and third base.
Both prospects feel like lottery tickets, which makes sense since Hill is more of a role player than a true difference maker. The Sox probably don’t feel like they are giving up much since Hill was getting pushed off the roster anyway. They also presumably feel that Campbell and Colmenares are better than anyone they could have spent the bonus pool money on. The international signing period begins in January and most of the notable youngsters would have signed by now. The Phils, meanwhile, bolster their outfield group without giving up much and can use that pool space to replace the prospects they surrendered.
Rutledge, 24, was just claimed off waivers from the Nationals last month. He has been kept on optional assignment since then, so he hasn’t appeared for the Phillies in the majors. He gave the Nats 103 innings from 2022 to 2026, allowing 6.29 earned runs per nine.
He now heads into DFA limbo for a second time this year. If he garners interest, it will mostly be about past pedigree. He was a first-round pick of the Nats in 2019, getting selected 17th overall but he never developed into the kind of player the Nats hoped they were getting. He was initially a starter but walked too many batters and got moved into a relief role. As mentioned, his major league results have not been good so far.
There’s not too much encouragement in his minor league numbers either. Dating back to the start of 2025, he has thrown 21 1/3 innings at the Triple-A level. His 3.80 ERA in that time looks nice but his 17.6% strikeout rate and 13.2% walk rate are both poor numbers. He is still optionable for the rest of this year but will be out of options next year. He will likely be put on waivers in the coming days. If he clears, he would not have the right to elect free agency, since he hasn’t yet been outrighted in his career and has less than three years of service time.
Photo courtesy of Darren Yamashita, Imagn Images
