The Munetaka Murakami Show heads to Chicago after brutal road trip to start White Sox’ season

MIAMI — There haven’t been many bright spots in the White Sox’ first six games, but it’s usually been Munetaka Murakami putting on the show.

Now, the 26-year-old first baseman, who has made a powerful impression in his first week in the big leagues, will bring The Murakami Show to Rate Field Friday for the Sox’ home opener, which was pushed back a day due to Thursday’s rainy forecast.

Murakami has gotten an early taste of the misery all too familiar to Sox fans as his new squad closed out their 1-5 season-opening road trip with a 10-0 blowout loss to the Marlins, mustering just three hits during Sandy Alcantara's masterful complete-game shutout at loanDepot Park.

Sox starter Shane Smith threw one into center-field while trying to turn a double play in the first, and the situation devolved with four straight hits leading to a quick 4-0 Miami lead. The Marlins put the game out of reach by the end of the third inning, tagging Smith for eight hits and seven earned runs.

Murakami didn’t fare any better against Alcantara than most of his teammates, going 0-for-3 with two strikeouts to end a five-game on-base streak to start his career. But he’s got five hits including three homers plus four walks with one MLB week under his belt.

“It's been really impressive, just the quality of at-bats,” assistant general manager Josh Barfield said. “He’s been facing guys for the first time, and facing really good arms.”

That includes Milwaukee ace Jacob Misiorowski, who battled to full counts against Murakami on Opening Day only to walk him twice. Later on that game against Brewers reliever Jake Woodford, Murakami hit the first of his three home runs in as many career games, a feat accomplished by only three other big-league rookies upon their debuts.

“We all knew he had power, but just the ease he's been able to get to the power has really stood out,” Barfield said. “We saw the work that he put in in spring training. You see the confidence that he has, and he's got a long track record of being successful in Japan.”

Murakami mashed 246 home runs across eight seasons in Nippon Professional Baseball, including 56 in 2022 for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows. Concerns about his strikeout rates drove down his price to the two-year, $34 million deal inked by general manager Chris Getz, and they haven’t evaporated. He’s struck out in nine of his 25 plate appearances.

“There’s still a long way to go and a lot of ways to improve. So that is what I’ll keep on doing in the upcoming days,” Murakami said via translator in Milwaukee. “Opposing pitchers are mixing it up. It’s really hard to really find out what they’re going to throw… Each and every situation is learning for me so that I can keep growing on that experience.”

And while some scouts have questioned his defense, Murakami has made a few nice defensive turns at first base after a spring of tutelage under Sox third base coach Justin Jirschele. Murakami mostly played third overseas.

“He's been great,” said manager Will Venable, who has shuttled Murakami up the batting order from sixth to fourth to second. “He's controlling the zone. He's hitting the ball hard. Defensively, he's done well. He's running extremely hard. He's doing everything we ask him to do.”

But with few exceptions, Venable hasn’t gotten much else out of his squad in an abysmal first week that has exposed deficiencies in all facets. The Sox have been outscored 52-21, with a team batting average of .192 sitting fifth-worst in baseball and an MLB-high .319 batting average against their pitchers. They’ve also been charged with six fielding errors.

“Really, that's on me,” Venable said. “Some of these things that we talked about that are important for us, we're just not executing. Whether it's my messaging or whatever, I need to change. We're going to see what we can do to be better at that, starting with me.”