The Chicago White Sox made a huge move this offseason, being the team to sign Japanese slugger Munetaka Murakami on a very reasonable $34 million contract.<\/p>\n
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So far this season, he’s been great, hitting only .206, but with four home runs and a .892 OPS. The White Sox slugger is off to a hot start, but it wouldn’t be a surprise to see some fans wondering if this is a fluky start to 2026 for Murakami.<\/p>\n
But, as MLB.com’s Mike Petriello found, there are two reasons why Murakami’s start to 2026 isn’t a fluke, but rather the norm going forward.<\/p>\n
“Likely good news for: Believing in J. Walker’s breakout, C. Walker’s rebound, or Murakami’s adjustment,” Petriello writes.<\/p>\n
What Petriello is referring to is two statistics that Murakami is placing well in, with bat speed being one, but the more important being his Blast rate on swings.<\/p>\n
“Blasts” refer to when a hitter squares up a baseball with a fast bat swing, and with Murakami’s average swing speed being 74 mph, he’s more than capable of reaching that threshold on his swings.<\/p>\n
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According to Baseball Savant, Murakami’s “Swing percentage” for Blasts is a strong 19.0%, which is tied for 14th best in all of Major League Baseball.<\/p>\n
More<\/strong>:\u00a0Mets didn\u2019t want to trade Brett Baty while White Sox didn\u2019t want Mark Vientos in Luis Robert Jr. trade<\/p>\n Put another way, on 19% of Murakami’s swings this season, he squares up the baseball and makes hard contact with a fast swing.<\/p>\n Those kinds of swings will lead to home runs, as seen by his four-homer start to the season. He’s been one of the best hitters in the Majors, and Petriello found that those are statistics that lead to success over the course of a full season.<\/p>\n Murakami has been one of the more fun hitters in the Majors to begin the season, and this hot start doesn’t look like a fluke for the White Sox slugger.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Chicago White Sox made a huge move this offseason, being the team to sign Japanese slugger Munetaka Murakami on a very reasonable $34 million contract. So… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":174137,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-174136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"White](\"https:\/\/images2.minutemediacdn.com\/image\/upload\/c_crop,w_1919,h_1079,x_0,y_0\/v1766330313\/images\/voltaxMediaLibrary\/mmsport\/229\/01kd0qv98y1crvfcxddm.png\")
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