White Sox 6, Blue Jays 3: Murakami’s star turn
At the time of his signing, the White Sox privately tamped down concerns about the risks of Munetaka Murakami’s profile by pointing to his ancillary position in their next contention window. The Japanese slugger is on a two-year deal after all, and both successful and unsuccessful versions of his tenure require the Sox to develop other centerpiece bats in due time.
But on a Saturday afternoon in April 2026, Murakami was quite clearly the star of the show on both sides of the ball. His booming, two-run, 431-foot demolition of a center-cut sinker from lefty reliever Brendan Little put the White Sox up for good in the sixth. And with help from Colson Montgomery’s Rate Field-shaped line drive solo shot two batters later to extend the margin, Murakami was able to keep the Sox ahead for good with a heads up defensive play in a series otherwise marked by his lack of familiarity with first base.
“It goes back to our preparation during the game and things like that, we’re trying to get different looks in the cage before we go out and hit against their lefties,” Montgomery said. “It’s like what [hitting coach Derek Shomon] talks about all the time, if you’re doing your scouting at the field, that’s too late.”
Opening the seventh, Murakami and Chris Murphy both converged on a Myles Straw chopper in the grass, with the latter not pivoting to first in time to beat the speedster of the bag. That was the first of two singles to chase Murphy, who gave way to Jordan Hicks. What eventually became Hicks’ most encouraging outing of the season to date still began with an eight-pitch walk to George Springer, loading the bases with one out. If Tristan Peters had a cannon (and Straw had a refrigerator on his back), Nathan Lukes’ soft fly to right might have offered a real chance for a play at the plate. Instead, it was perfect fodder for Murakami to concede the run at home, cut off the throw and make Tyler Heineman the goat for the second-straight day by throwing him out easily advancing to third to end the frame with a 4-3 lead preserved.
“”Traditionally there’s a mindset that outfielders have that it’s their job to throw guys out, and that’s really not the case,” said Will Venable. “You just have to play fundamental baseball and hit the cut-off guy.”
“I was seeing the second base runner so at that moment I was going to throw it to third,” Murakami said via interpreter. “I knew that home, I couldn’t make it. So it was reactive to find a way to throw him out at third. It’s an everyday kind of play.”
As it turned out, Heineman was more than capable of filling that role without assistance. Luisangel Acuña looked to have loaded the bases in the eighth with a two-out infield single, but Miguel Vargas was expecting a throw to first and overran the bag at third. He was caught in a rundown until Heineman threw the ball into the outfield for the second-straight day, staking Seranthony Domínguez to a three-run lead for the save.
The Blue Jays were the most strikeout-avoidant offense in the sport last year and they certainly looked the part on Saturday, most notably in holding Anthony Kay without a strikeout in 4 1/3 innings and whiffing on only three of their 34 swings against him. But up until the end of Kay’s afternoon, this was more of a descriptive detail than a qualitative assessment.
“The two teams that I’ve faced so far are the Brewers and the Jays and they like to put the ball in play,” Kay said. “It kind of just lets you be freely in the zone and let them hit it, and let the defense do the work.”
After your garden-variety Grant Taylor perfect first, Kay didn’t face a real jam until the fourth, largely enabled by Murakami losing the handle on the exchange for a potential double play ball. With the bases juiced, Kay got two sliders on the hands of right-handed hitters. The first popped Ernie Clement up in the infield, the second stayed up enough for Straw to fly out to the wall, and both themes would emerge in the sixth.
Guerrero had nearly golfed a down-and-in sweeper out to left earlier in the fourth, only to watch it die in Austin Hays’ glove at the fence. After Davis Schneider managed to turn an 0-2 count into a walk to lead off the sixth, Guerrero essentially got a mulligan on what looked like it was supposed to be a backdoor slider that found its way back to the down-and-in quadrant, and in turn found its way into the left field seats to stake Toronto to a brief 2-1 lead.
Bullet points:
*Vargas reached base all four times (two walks, two hair-on-fire doubles) and made a number of nice plays at third base. Even his baserunning gaffe led to two runs.
*Luisangel Acuña looked like he was acclimating to the swirling winds off the lake for much of the afternoon, especially when he called off Austin Hays only to almost run into him on a fly ball to end the third. But they were all routine outs in the box score.
*Murakami got dinged for a pitch timer violation before striking out to end the third and strand Vargas at second. They don’t have a pitch clock in NPB.
*Taylor walked out from the bullpen to “Freebird” by Lynyrd Skynyrd, the album version of which clocks in at nine minutes and eight seconds. That’s probably longer than the combined time of his two perfect innings of work the past two days.
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