CLEVELAND — Injured slugger Munetaka Murakami is expected to begin a rehab assignment with Triple-A Charlotte on Tuesday, and he could rejoin the White Sox on their homestand this week, manager Will Venable said Sunday.
Murakami, who’s tied for second on the team with 20 home runs despite missing five weeks with a strained right hamstring, ran the bases Saturday and was supposed to run them again Sunday. With the field covered because of rain, that’s unlikely to happen. But after he recovered well from running, all signs point to him starting his rehab.
The Sox had said that Murakami ran the bases Friday, meaning he would’ve fulfilled the team’s requirement for running without issue on back-to-back days Saturday. But Venable said Murakami ran on the field Friday, not the bases, making Saturday his first day on the bases.
Venable said the plan for Sunday was for Murakami to do some kind of running, and assuming he recovers well from that, he’ll travel to Charlotte on Monday and be in the Knights’ lineup Tuesday for their home game against Nashville. After a couple of rehab games, Munetaka could be in the Sox’ lineup Friday, which would mark exactly six weeks since the injury.
“There’s a week’s worth of games mapped out,” Venable said. “That doesn’t mean that he’s necessarily going to play all those games. We want to be really mindful of the injury, the significance of it and the build-up. You build in a plan, but certainly if it goes well, it doesn’t have to play out every single game. It’s day-to-day, but I would assume a couple of games at least.”
The Sox have held their own without Murakami, entering their game Sunday against the Guardians going 16-15 in his absence. When they put Murakami on the injured list May 30, a day after he suffered the injury, the Sox were 30-27 and three games behind the first-place Guardians. They entered Sunday 46-42 and tied for first with the Guardians.
At the time of the injury, Murakami led the American League in runs scored (43) and was tied for first in home runs and RBI (41). He also ranked third in OPS (.947) and fourth in slugging (.566) and walks (44).
“We need him back obviously on the field, but just his presence,” Venable said. “It just means so much to have him in the lineup. I remember what it meant to have [former Padres teammate] Adrian Gonzalez in the lineup. When you have a guy like that — and we have a lot of those guys — everyone has a little more confidence in your ability to win that game.”
When Murakami is ready to return, the Sox will have a tough roster decision to make. Jacob Gonzalez has improved manning first base in Murakami’s stead, and his bat has come alive since going 10 games without a hit. In his previous nine games entering Sunday, Gonzalez slashed .406/.457/.625 (13-for-32) with one homer and 12 RBI. Overall, he’s hitting .471 (8-for-17) with 14 RBI with runners in scoring position.
The Sox could send outfielder Junior Perez back to Charlotte instead. He has started only five games since being called up June 18, and he has only four hits in 21 at-bats, though two of them are home runs. If the Sox keep Gonzalez, they’d have to make room for him elsewhere on the field. He played mostly shortstop and second base in the minors.
“Yeah, that’s possible,” Venable said. “And certainly defensive versatility is something that we value, and that’s really given us the opportunity to play with different alignments and find different ways to get guys at-bats. We’ll see when we get there.
“You look at how we’re constructed, certainly Jacob has done such a good job, just like everybody else has performed well. So there’s no guarantee that it’s going to be any one guy. We’ll talk with [general manager Chris Getz] and think it through. It will be a tough decision, but that’s a good problem to have.”
