{"id":663565,"date":"2026-04-04T22:55:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T22:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/663565\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T22:55:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T22:55:16","slug":"munetaka-murakami-colson-montgomery-fuel-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/663565\/","title":{"rendered":"Munetaka Murakami, Colson Montgomery fuel win"},"content":{"rendered":"

It didn\u2019t take long for Munetaka Murakami to adjust to his new home park.<\/p>\n

The first baseman hit a go-ahead two-run home run in the sixth inning Saturday during a 6-3 victory against the Toronto Blue Jays in front of 18,389 at Rate Field. Colson Montgomery added a solo shot later in the sixth for the Sox, who secured a series win against last year\u2019s American League champions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was always a dream for me to play here and then hit in front of the crowd here at Rate Field,\u201d Murakami said through an interpreter. \u201cTo get that one out is really pleasant.\u201d<\/p>\n

Murakami has four home runs in eight games after signing a two-year deal with the Sox<\/a> in the offseason. The home run Saturday was the first at Rate Field for the two-time Nippon Professional Baseball Japanese Central League Most Valuable Player.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s built for this,\u201d manager Will Venable said. \u201cHe\u2019s been everything that we imagined as far as his impact in the clubhouse, who he is as a person, his play on the field defensively as well as the power and plate discipline. Really good stuff from Mune.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sox relied on small ball, from double steals to bunts, during their home opener Friday for a 5-4 victory in 10 innings<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On Saturday, it was all about the long ball.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth those guys (Murakami and Montgomery) can change the game with one swing, we saw it today,\u201d Venable said. \u201cTo have that in your lineup is huge. We want to be able to have slug in there. We want to be able to pressure the defense with Tristan Peters and (Derek) Hill and talking about the bunts we\u2019ve talked about since spring training.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to find different ways to score runs on different nights. Today we were able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Blue Jays started the power display with a two-run home run from Vladimir Guerrero Jr. in the the top of the sixth for a 2-1 lead. That was the only mistake made by Sox pitcher Anthony Kay, who allowed two runs on three hits with two walks and no strikeouts in 4 1\/3 innings following opener Grant Taylor\u2019s perfect one inning of work.<\/p>\n

\"WhiteWhite Sox shortstop Colson Montgomery rounds the bases after hitting a solo home run in the sixth inning against the Blue Jays on Saturday, April 4, 2026, at Rate Field. (Erin Hooley\/AP)<\/p>\n

\u201cOverall it was pretty good,\u201d Kay said of his outing. \u201cThey\u2019re a very contact-oriented team, so I wanted to let them put the ball in play and let the defense make some plays.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose guys behind me made some good plays. Overall, pretty solid. Obviously, the pitch to Vladdy \u2014 wasn\u2019t even a terrible pitch, just a good piece of hitting by him. That\u2019s what he does.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miguel Vargas began the bottom of the sixth with a double against Blue Jays reliever Brendon Little. Murakami followed with the 431-foot home run on a 1-1 sinker in the lefty-lefty battle, putting the Sox ahead 3-2.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat (top of the) inning, they got to us,\u201d Murakami said. \u201cSo definitely I wanted to get a run in. I wanted to move the runner forward and not too much. It was the best result coming off the bat.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was really glad we were able to push that lead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Montgomery came up with one out and lined a 3-1 sinker just over the right-field wall, extending the Sox lead to 4-2. It was Montgomery\u2019s second home run of the season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt goes back to our preparation during the game,\u201d Montgomery said. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to get different looks in the cage before we go out and hit against their lefties who are really pretty good. It goes back to the coaches\u2019 game plans with us.<\/p>\n

\u201cMe and Mune probably had very similar plans, we were just trying to see him up and over the plate and try to put our best swing on it, and we were both able to put good swings on the ball.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Blue Jays scored a run in the seventh on a sacrifice fly to right by Nathan Lukes. Tyler Heineman attempted to advance from second on the play, but right fielder Peters made a strong throw to the cutoff man Murakami, who fired to third in time to get Heineman for the final out of the inning.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was seeing the second-base runner so at that moment I was going to throw it to third,\u201d Murakami said. \u201cI made a good play out of it, so I\u2019m really happy I made that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heineman made a defensive mistake in the eighth, leading to two insurance runs for the Sox. Vargas got caught in a rundown between home and third, and the catcher Heineman threw the ball wildly into left field. Vargas and Austin Hays scored on the sequence, making it 6-3, and the Sox (3-5) were on their way to their second straight home victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a really fun crowd,\u201d Murakami said. \u201cThey are really, really loud. They are cheering us on. I\u2019m happy to play in front of them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It didn\u2019t take long for Munetaka Murakami to adjust to his new home park. The first baseman hit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":663566,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2379],"tags":[10945,5,138,49,2561,10448,11613,4154,4,73,70,396,2562],"class_list":{"0":"post-663565","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-white-sox","8":"tag-anthony-kay","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-chicago","11":"tag-chicago-white-sox","12":"tag-chicagowhitesox","13":"tag-colson-montgomery","14":"tag-grant-taylor","15":"tag-miguel-vargas","16":"tag-mlb","17":"tag-munetaka-murakami","18":"tag-toronto-blue-jays","19":"tag-white-sox","20":"tag-whitesox"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116348908250162537","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663565","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=663565"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/663565\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/663566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=663565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=663565"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=663565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}