Murakami's historic HR streak bright spot in messy affair for White Sox

MILWAUKEE -- Munetaka Murakami stood in front of the media following a 6-1 loss suffered by his White Sox to Milwaukee Saturday night at American Family Field, waiting to talk about his second homer in two career games.

The interview in English, through translator Kenzo Yagi, would go first before the Japanese press. But there was a 10 second lull prior to a question being asked.

“Finished?” said a smiling Murakami, drawing a laugh from the crowd of 20-25 media members.

No, the White Sox first baseman is not close to being finished. In fact, what could become a very impressive Major League Baseball run for the 26-year-old who came from an extremely impressive stretch in Japan is just getting started.

Murakami connected off Chad Patrick on the first pitch of the fourth inning Saturday. The Statcast-projected 409-foot blast made the left-handed-hitting slugger the second Japanese-born former NPB player to homer in each of his first two MLB games, joining Kenji Johjima. He’s also the first player in White Sox history to homer in each of his first two career games.

“I didn’t know I was the first one to hit two home runs in a row,” said Murakami through Yagi. “But at the end, I need to keep studying the pitchers. The pitchers are going to be studying me. I will try to keep improving so I can keep this up and contribute to winning games.”

“Yeah, he looks great,” said White Sox manager Will Venable of Murakami. “Controlling the zone, the damage is there. We’ve got to keep him right there, get some guys on base for him and keep it going.”

That long drive from Murakami had a 102.9 mph exit velocity, per Statcast, and would have been a homer in 22 of 30 MLB ballparks. Murakami connected in the ninth inning of Thursday’s 14-2 Opening Day loss, leading off against Jake Woodford.

So two highlight reel homers for Murakami, leaving him tied with a long list of former players at two blasts for his White Sox career, including Bobby Bonilla, Pablo Ozuna and general manager Chris Getz. It was Getz who brought Murakami to the White Sox via a two-year, $34 million deal.

There also have been two less-than-stellar losing efforts for the White Sox. Milwaukee is the sort of team the White Sox aspire to be at their most successful future level.

Work the opposing pitchers, put the ball consistently in play. Steal a base or two. Take the extra base whenever possible, come up with big hits and make the right defensive decision more often than not.

These two setbacks, albeit the first two of a 162-game season, show the White Sox remain a work in progress. Saturday’s loss had too many blemishes for a team priding itself during Spring Training in being aggressive and prepared.

Andrew Benintendi had two tough defensive plays in left field, misreading a Bryce Turang leadoff double near the wall and contributing to three first-inning runs off Sean Burke. Benintendi also couldn’t get to Turang’s second-inning bloop double down the left-field line, with Turang coming around to score on Burke’s errant throw off Christian Yelich’s infield single.

“With that first play, [Benintendi] felt the wall come and just kind of decided that his route was over,” Venable said. “And then the one that bounced towards the line, a lot of ground to cover there.”

Right fielder Everson Pereira overthrew the cutoff man on Jake Bauers’ first-inning single to right, leaving Yelich at third and allowing Bauers to go to second. Both runners scored on Garrett Mitchell’s single to center. The Brewers also finished 7-for-7 in stolen bases.

“Yeah, we’ve got to clean it up,” Venable said. “There’s a lot to point to where we need to improve. These guys, they’re playing hard, but we’ve got to clean up some of this stuff that these guys can do a better job of, for sure.”

“Obviously not how we want to start,” Burke said. “We're capable of playing much better baseball than this, on every facet of the game. The Brewers are a good team, so we've got to be able to make those adjustments and play a little better if we want to play up to that level.”

Along with the two long balls, Murakami has walked three times in the first two games, and is settling in at first base -- robbing Bauers with a diving play in the bottom of the fifth inning. His first career strikeout came against southpaw Aaron Ashby to strand two runners in the fifth, so let’s classify his start as nearly perfect.