White Sox baseball has not been fun to watch since the start of the second half of the Major League Baseball season.
The team lost their ninth-straight game Sunday, falling 5-4 to the Kansas City Royals. One of the more intriguing storylines for the weekend series with the Royals was that it was Yoan Moncada’s first full series since making his White Sox debut on Wednesday.
Moncada got off to a hot start in the first game on Friday and provided excitement for the White Sox fan base as he drove in the team’s first four runs of the game.
His first at-bat on Friday resulted in a ground out to first but was a productive one as he drove in a run from third.
The big hit came in his next at bat as with the bases loaded and batting left handed. Moncada cleared the bases with a hit to the left center field gap showing his power to all parts of the field.
More impressive was Moncada’s speed around the bases as according to Statcast, he was clocked with the fastest home to third time for any White Sox player this year taking only 11.24 second to get from home to third on the hit.
Following Friday’s game, Moncada went hitless on both Saturday and Sunday with a walk coming in his last plate appearance on Saturday night.
Playing the field, Moncada has made all the plays that have come his way and has yet to commit an error so far at second base.
He showed good poise in the 1st inning of today’s game as with a pop up on the infield, both the shortstop Tyler Saladino and third baseman Yolmer Sanchez could not locate the ball and it was Moncada called everyone off to make the grab.
What probably has been the most notable aspect of Moncada’s game since being called up has been his plate discipline as he has only struck out only once in his 15 plate appearances so far.
This is important to remember because when Moncada was called up in September of last season by the Boston Red Sox, of his 19 at bat last season, 12 of those at bats resulted in strikeouts.
He so far has not looked overmatched at the plate as he is averaging 5 pitches per at bats so far with the White Sox, Moncada has put the ball in play 12 times, with producing productive outs on three occasions.
The one positive for Moncada going 1 for 13 with 2 walks, is that if he stays disciplined at the plate and keeping putting the ball in play, those batted balls will soon fall in for base hits.
With his first full series out of the way, Moncada will see the attention of him being called up fade away as the games go on, enabling him to concentrate on getting more acclimated the daily MLB grind.
So far, Moncada has not set the world on fire since being called up, but he has shown a sense of comfort playing in the majors as today’s game was the first of the our games he has played in where he did not reach base safely.
The next step for Moncada will be adjusting to scouting reports and he will get a good test this week as the White Sox play the rival Cubs for four straight starting Monday.
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