{"id":753670,"date":"2026-07-10T01:13:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T01:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/753670\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T01:13:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T01:13:15","slug":"murakami-returns-friday-after-being-out-since-may-hamstring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/753670\/","title":{"rendered":"Murakami returns Friday after being out since May (hamstring)"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHICAGO —Munetaka Murakami<\/a> is expected to return to the slumping Chicago White Sox<\/a> on Friday night after being sidelined since May by a strained right hamstring.<\/p>\n

Murakami made two rehab appearances with Triple-A Charlotte, going 2-for-7 with a double. Following Chicago’s 2-1 loss to Boston<\/a> on Thursday, White Sox manager Will Venable said Murakami would be in the starting lineup for the opener of the team’s weekend series against the Athletics<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“He’s ready to go,” Venable said. “He was challenged running the bases, defensively, had a really long game yesterday. So, feel good about the workload, recovered well today so he’s ready to go.”<\/p>\n

Murakami got hurt during a 4-3 victory over the Detroit Tigers<\/a> on May 29, grabbing his right hamstring after beating a throw to first on a fielder’s choice in the third inning. At the time of the injury, the Japanese rookie ranked among the major league leaders with 20 homers, 41 RBI, 43 runs and a .947 OPS.<\/p>\n

Chicago (47-45) is in a virtual tie with Cleveland<\/a> (48-46) for the lead in the sluggish AL Central. But the White Sox have dropped three in a row and six of eight overall. They managed just two runs and 15 hits in the three-game set against the Red Sox.<\/p>\n

White Sox outfielder Andrew Benintendi<\/a> said getting Murakami back right now is huge.<\/p>\n

“Obviously, he’s a presence in the lineup,” he said. “He’ll bring the energy, I think. It seems like the vibe in here is kind of down right now but I’m sure seeing him tomorrow will spark it back up.”<\/p>\n

The 26-year-old Murakami signed a $34 million, two-year contract with Chicago in December. The White Sox went 17-18 while he was on the injured list.<\/p>\n

“We understand the impact he makes on the field and in the clubhouse so to activate him is going to mean a lot for our group,” Venable said. “Really excited about him.”br\/]<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 ESPN Internet Ventures. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO —Munetaka Murakami is expected to return to the slumping Chicago White Sox on Friday night after being…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":753671,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[323124,2318,352,363,268340,3,99],"class_list":["post-753670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-323124","tag-chicago-white-sox","tag-espn","tag-mlb","tag-murakami-munetaka","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=753670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/753670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/753671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=753670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=753670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=753670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}