The Chicago White Sox have announced that slugger Munetaka Murakami is expected to miss four to six weeks with a Grade 2 right hamstring strain.
Murakami, who at the time of his injury was tied for the AL lead in home runs with 20, appeared to injure his leg while attempting to beat out a double play on Friday. In a corresponding move, the club has placed Murakami on the 10-Day IL while calling up infielder Jacob Gonzalez from Triple-A Charlotte.
“It’s tough, obviously,” manager Will Venable said Saturday. “He makes a massive impact on our group, on and off the field.”
“He’s probably pretty down right now, knowing that’s going to take a different form here over the next few weeks. This is what every single team deals with and you’ve got to try to find ways to continue to put plays together and play well and play good baseball.”
After signing a 2 year, $34M contract to join the MLB ranks from Japan, Murakami is hitting .240 with four doubles, 41 RBI, 44 walks, 43 runs scored and a .938 OPS over 57 games. His play is a major reason why the White Sox are currently 2 games off the AL Central lead at the moment following the 2025 season in which they lost 102 games.
“My goal was to [play] the full season healthy, but that really didn’t come out well,” Murakami said. “But after this injury, I will recover fully, 100%, and give them all each and every day. I’m not going to be adjusting anything after the injury or nothing like that.”
Chicago will wrap up their series vs. the Tigers on Sunday before continuing their divisional tour with a game against the Twins on Monday.
Photo: Nesnad. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.