Chase Meidroth 'locked in' atop White Sox' batting order

MILWAUKEE — White Sox second baseman Chase Meidroth’s bat toss after his leadoff home run on Opening Day seemed to herald big things to start the year.

Unfortunately, most of his teammates — aside from slugging sensations Munetaka Murakami and Colson Montgomery — didn’t exactly follow suit on a rough opening weekend, but Meidroth hasn't let up as the Sox' leadoff man cements himself in the organization’s plans.

Meidroth, 24, added a double Saturday on a 3-for-10 opening weekend with three walks, while bringing an edge to the top of the order along with a welcome dose of sound defense. He made two diving catches Sunday.

“Just finding my rhythm again,” said Meidroth, whose .253/.329/.320 rookie campaign was hampered by a nagging hand injury.

“He’s just locked in at the plate,” manager Will Venable said. “We know he treats every pitch like it’s his last and wants to make the right decision up there. He’s just extremely competitive, [has] put himself in a really nice spot at the top of the order to really set the tone for our group.”

“We’re seeing the best version of him right now,” Venable added.

Greener pastures

Sox castoff Luis Robert Jr. introduced himself to the Mets with a bang, slamming a walk-off three-run homer in his second game in Queens on Saturday.

The five-tool talent who never quite found his groove in Chicago went 5-for-11 with five RBI and three walks in his first series with New York after Sox GM Chris Getz dealt him in exchange for utility player Luisangel Acuña.

His splashy Big Apple debut was salt in the wound for Sox fans, whom Robert jabbed before Opening Day when he correctly predicted to reporters that Citi Field was “going to be packed, which is something that over the last few years in Chicago I didn’t get to experience.”

Time will tell if Robert finds sustained success like Andrew Vaughn found last year after being dumped by the Sox and scooped up by the Brewers en route to their NLCS run.

Vaughn, who hit .308/.375/.493 in Milwaukee after extended struggles on the South Side, knocked an RBI single off the Sox Thursday in his first appearance against the team that drafted him. But he also suffered a hand injury that’s expected to sideline him till May.

“Another baseball game with a team on the other side,” Vaughn said before missing the final two games of the series against his old squad. “Can’t really look at it any other way.”

On the board

Center fielder Tristan Peters, an offseason acquisition from the Rays, talked his way into his first career hit Saturday.

The 26-year-old Manitoba native roped a liner to center in the fourth inning on a 3-2 pitch from Brewers starter Chad Patrick, and "the whole way I was saying, 'Just get down, get down, get down,' but I didn't think so at first,” Peters said. A diving Garrett Mitchell couldn’t haul it in, resulting in a double on an otherwise moribund evening for Sox hitters.

Peters, who played at Southern Illinois University, picked up another single Sunday. He went hitless in his first four big-league games last year in Tampa Bay.

“It kinda plays with you mentally a bit," he said. "You start to press, kind of throw away at-bats, but I was trying not to press too much, just kind of do my thing.”

Contributing: Steve Greenberg