Munetaka Murakami cannot save the White Sox from this ‘D-‘ grade originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Chicago White Sox fans were jumping for joy when they learned their team was the lucky one to sign Munetaka Murakami. They knew he had power, and he wasted no time showing that off.
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Across 19 games, the Japanese slugger is hitting .167/.346/.417 with five home runs and nine runs batted in. And while the batting average isn’t great, he is tied for the 12th-most home runs across MLB.
The problem is that he is nearly the only person doing anything worth writing home about offensively. They have the worst team batting average in the league and have only scored 60 runs so far, which is the second-least in baseball.
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Munetaka Murakami cannot save the White Sox from this ‘D-‘ grade
On top of the little bit the offense is going, the pitching staff is not much better. Starting pitchers and the bullpen have struggled, compiling a 5.91 team ERA, which is also good for second-worst.
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Not having a good offense or a good pitching staff is not ideal, and the White Sox will have to figure this out quickly if they don’t want to dig too deep a hole early.
Bleacher Report’s Kerry Miller isn’t sold on the club turning this around, giving them a failing grade.
“White Sox (6-13): D-
The good news is Munetaka Murakami is hitting the ball well with five home runs and an OPS north of .800. The bad news is no one else on this team has been able to hit the broad side of a barn while Opening Day starter and 2025 All-Star Shane Smith has already been optioned back to Triple-A.”
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Fans weren’t gearing up for a contending year, but they were hoping this team would be a little better with what they did over the offseason. However, there is still plenty of time for this to turn around, and the club could think about calling up some of their top prospects to give the team a bit of a spark.
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