CHICAGO –– Shane Smith took a step toward returning from injury on Saturday at Rate Field.

Prior to the White Sox game against the Cubs at 6:10 p.m. CT, the rookie right-hander threw about 55 pitches and three ups as part of a live batting practice session. Smith was placed on the 15-day injured list, retroactive to July 16, with a left ankle sprain suffered while running during the team’s workout day in Pittsburgh.

“I think it went pretty well,” Smith said. “Good feel for the stuff. It’s really cool to face our guys. I can get an insight on what they are doing and what they see a little bit easier. Yeah, it felt good to be back on the bump. … The soreness is pretty much gone. Threw a bullpen the other day and it felt pretty good. Today I didn’t feel anything.”

Manager Will Venable thought Smith looked good, noting the shapes of his pitches and the fact that he was in the zone. Most important, he said Smith came out of it feeling good.

Venable is unsure what the next steps in Smith’s recovery process will be, whether it’s another live batting practice session or a rehab assignment. The team will further evaluate him today and build a plan for the coming days.

Smith believes he may be able to rejoin the starting rotation without pitching in an injury rehab assignment.

“I think so. I would like to,” Smith said. “If everything they saw and everything I feel feels good, I hope they give me the OK to go ahead.”

Along with monitoring how his ankle feels, Smith has focused on making sure his mechanics and delivery are in the right spot. During Saturday’s batting practice session, he faced Brooks Baldwin, Tim Elko and Josh Rojas, who provided him with valuable insights.

“Talking to Rojas, I’d like to start introducing the slider a little bit more to lefties,” Smith said. “I threw one, he fouled it off pretty hard and it was down. So he was like, ‘If you can get that in or up to make it a little more cuttery, that’s going to open up everything on the other half of the plate.’ The next at-bat, I threw him one backdoor and he was like, ‘If anyone is on that, you can get it because they are leaning over.’”

Prior to his injury, the White Sox limited Smith to three innings and 46 pitches. They want to protect their 25-year-old All-Star, who’s nearing his career-high of 94.1 innings in a single season. He set that mark last year with the Milwaukee Brewers’ Double-A and Triple-A affiliates, and has pitched 86.2 innings with the White Sox in his first major league season.

He wants to pitch, but understands the approach at the same time.

“I get it. I think the biggest thing is making sure you have enough workload for the next year,” Smith said. “It’s the fine line between do you throw 180 innings or whatever it is in one year, and then the next year you throw 200? Or is it you make sure you have a good balance of whatever the number looks like this year going in strong and full for the next one.”

“I’m just hoping to get the ball every five days. If they want to give me an extra day like they did early on, they can. But no restraints being put on.”

The last time Smith took the mound in a game was the 2025 All-Star game in Atlanta, where he hit one batter by pitch and induced a groundout in the next. Perhaps the more valuable parts of the All-Star break were the conversations he had with teammates, including a former White Sox pitcher.

“I talked to [Garrett] Crochet a good bit because we have people in common here, so that was an easy kind of gateway. I think it’s interesting just what’s his fastball usage, what’s his offspeed usage and how do you play with that? And making sure that whatever the hitter tells you, you listen to that. Not too much, but scouting reports aside, what do you see when you’re on the mound and what do you see when they take pitches?”

Since returning from the All-Star break, Smith’s White Sox teammates have gone on an absolute tear. They’re 6-1 against the Pirates, Rays and Cubs, highlighted by a MLB-best 61 runs and plus-33 run differential.

On Friday, they took Game 1 of the Crosstown Classic 12-5 and scored seven runs off Cubs’ ace Shota Imanaga. While he’s enjoyed watching it, Smith hopes he can contribute to the team’s turnaround soon.

“It makes me want to play. I want to be a part of this and get out there and put up a good start for the team and have us keep rolling,” Smith said. “Watching it has been the most fun we’ve had all year. We are playing really well and I think the close games we were losing early on in the year, the one run games or two-run games, we are starting to separate ourselves from that and really putting things together.”