CHICAGO -- Studying the MLB Draft has been a passion for Matt Roffe since he was a young kid, thoroughly enjoying player evaluations and frequently going through Draft manuals.
So, Roffe officially taking over as the new White Sox director of amateur scouting seems to be the true fulfillment of childhood baseball destiny.
“This is really the space where you get to infuse talent into an organization,” said Roffe during Thursday’s introductory Zoom. “You're going to get your 20 or more picks, so it's just an incredible opportunity to partake in that and infuse an organization with impact players.
“I'm just really excited, looking forward to this opportunity. It's something I've been looking for my entire life, so I can't wait to begin.”
Although Roffe is not quite a kid at 30 years old, he becomes another youthful and knowledgeable component of a top-notch front office staff put together by Chris Getz since he took over as general manager on Aug. 31, 2023. A number of these hires came from outside the White Sox organization.
An extensive interview process allowed Roffe to interact with Getz, assistant general managers Josh Barfield and Carlos Rodriguez, director of acquisition Matt Grabowski, director of player personnel Gene Watson and David Keller, a special assistant to Getz in charge of international scouting. Roffe also spoke with director of player development Paul Janish and other members of the player development staff, as it's an area linked to amateur scouting.
“We're going to collaborate really well together to identify what we're really good at developing and try to bake that into our evaluations as much as possible,” Roffe said. “That's obviously critical in making that streamlined and getting impact players that we feel internally good about developing and always playing to players' strengths. But also understanding what their weaknesses are and how we can supplement them.
“It was just an enjoyable process to go through, and I felt like the organization has made great strides over the last two years, in particular, with the type of talent -- doesn't hurt to have the first overall pick and take Roch Cholowsky. So that's really important to be able to have that nice foundation of talent to begin. And I'm walking into a situation where there's a lot of great homegrown players already.”
The White Sox traveled the title path in adding Roffe, who served as assistant director of amateur scouting for the recently crowned 2026 World Series champion Brewers since November 2025. Roffe held the positions of manager of scouting operations (2024-25) and coordinator of scouting operations (2022-23) with the Brewers for the previous four seasons before his final promotion in Milwaukee.
Roffe was a player personnel and pro scouting analyst for Arizona from 2019-2021, where he crossed over with Barfield, who was then the director of player development for the Diamondbacks. He also worked previously as an intern with the Brewers and Padres and as a Statcast and labor relations intern with Major League Baseball. This position opened when Mike Shirley resigned on Sept. 12 of this past season.
Shirley oversaw the ‘26 White Sox Draft, featuring the highest bonus pool in MLB Draft history at $20,489,500 and including the selection of Cholowsky.
“Matt brings a clear vision for how amateur scouting can continue to evolve, pairing the insight and conviction of our scouts with objective information and strong collaboration across the organization,” said Getz in a statement from Thursday’s press release. “His experience with Milwaukee’s draft and player development processes will be valuable as we continue growing our own approach to consistently identifying and developing impact talent.”
“I've only heard good things from the Brewers' staff about all the scouts with the White Sox,” Roffe said. “Now that I'm here and part of this, I'm just excited to get to know people on a personal level and work together as a team to accomplish bringing another World Series championship back to the South Side.”
His Brewers’ World Series title experience was a dream come true for Roffe, shortly before the White Sox present dream came true for the native of New York and graduate of Washington University in St. Louis.
“It was the most incredible experience of my life,” said Roffe of the historic Milwaukee title run. “The White Sox were extremely gracious with giving me the opportunity to enjoy that.
“Being able to hug our scouts, all our front-office staff when we won, and the parade was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. To be able to see that and the fans of Milwaukee and everyone in the state of Wisconsin to come out and to support our team was just so meaningful. I'll never forget that."