White Sox maximizing their strength, ranking fifth in percentage of runs via home run

When Munetaka Murakami homered Saturday, the White Sox had themselves the franchise’s first trio of players with at least 30 home runs in a season since 2008 and their fourth trio or foursome in team history.

Murakami joined Miguel Vargas, who was the first to 30, and Colson Montgomery. After Randal Grichuk and Kyle Teel homered in a 10-1 victory Sunday night against the Twins, the Sox rank fifth in the majors with 188 home runs.

The Sox have ridden the long ball to first place in the American League Central with 19 games left in the regular season. In fact, of the six division leaders, the Sox are the only team with more than one player with at least 30 homers.

Considering the Sox are so dependent on home runs, it’s fair to wonder if they’re getting the most out of them. Are they maximizing their biggest strength?

“The question is are you maximizing the personnel that you have on the field,” Sox hitting coach Derek Shomon told the Sun-Times. “This group is largely a decisions and a damage group. There is some swing and miss.

“That’s what you try to attack more than anything, but also understanding it may only get marginally better, so you have to lean into the things that you do well. This is an offense that does not chase, that will take their walks and can leave the yard at any time.”

Shomon’s comment about the Sox being “a decisions and a damage group” comes from their hitting tenets: swing decisions, making contact and doing damage. The contact part has been a problem. The Sox rank sixth in the majors in strikeouts with 1,301. No other division leader is in the top 10.

To reframe the question of maximizing home runs, are the Sox putting enough runners on base to make the most of the homers they hit? According to Elias, they’re doing that better than most. Entering Sunday, the Sox ranked fifth in the majors in runs scored via home run at 44.6% The Reds ranked first at 49.9%.

“You want to touch pillows as often as possible,” the colorful Shomon said, referring to bases. “It’s something that we talk about as a group, finding a way. Whether that’s a hit by pitch, a walk, reaching on an error.

“But where you do see the offense falter a little bit is there is some swing and miss. Adjustments are certainly talked about, they’re worked on. Do they always show up? Not necessarily. But again, we have to lean on the things that we do well, and that’s forcing pitchers into the strike zone, driving up pitch counts and taking advantage of mistakes.”

Murakami, Montgomery and Vargas are doing just that. The last Sox trio with 30-plus homers was Carlos Quentin, Jermaine Dye and Jim Thome. In 2006, Joe Crede, Dye, Thome and Paul Konerko all hit at least 30. In 2004, Konerko, Carlos Lee and Jose Valentin did it.

What’s more, Murakami became just the fourth Japanese-born player in MLB history to hit 30 home runs, joining Shohei Ohtani (six times), Seiya Suzuki (2025) and Hideki Matsui (2004). The Sox’ season is historic locally and internationally.

And those homers could loom large in the final week of the season, when the Sox face the Royals and Rockies, who rank eighth and fourth, respectively, in most home runs allowed. What fortuitous timing for a team whose playoff push figures to go down to the wire.

But the Sox didn’t need any homers to beat the Twins. They led 5-1 when Grichuk homered to lead off the eighth inning, and Teel later launched a three-run shot. Before all that, Murakami had an RBI single, Sam Antonacci a two-run double and Grichuk added an RBI single. Vargas walked in a run, and Tristan Peters had a two-run double.

Runs via home runs

Entering Sunday, the White Sox ranked fifth in the majors in the percentage of runs scored via home runs, according to Elias.

1. Reds 49.9%

2. Mariners 47.8%

3. Yankees 47.0%

4. Cubs 45.1%

5. SOX 44.6%