Munetaka Murakami’s future in Chicago does not need to be decided today, and the latest round of chatter didn’t really change that.
White Sox general manager Chris Getz touched on the subject during an appearance on the New York Post’s baseball podcast with Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman, but he didn’t exactly move the ball down the field.
"I think he's really happy here, and we're happy to have him here," Getz said. We would love to have him here long-term.
It seems that he has interest, and we do as well. We've had some conversations, but we'll just leave it at that."
That’s essentially where things have sat for months, whether the conversation was popping up in May, around the All-Star Game or now. The White Sox are thrilled with what Murakami has delivered in Chicago - the production, the ambition, the energy - and Murakami has found a place where he’s been able to quiet the doubters, win over the fan base and help a first-place team.
Still, the push for an extension beyond his original two-year, $34 million deal has always run into the same problem: the two sides do not seem to be operating on the same clock.
Murakami had to know that a two-year contract would put him on a path toward the open market, or at least toward using free agency to reach something close to full value. The White Sox, meanwhile, have every reason to be cautious with a low-average, high-SLG, high-strikeout slugger whose value can swing quickly if the bat cools off for too long.
The comparison points tell the story. Kyle Schwarber, who sits third in home runs since 2021 and could lead the National League in that category for the third time in five years, has still landed deals that are hefty but not outlandish by star-hitter standards: four years, $79 million in 2021 and five years, $150 million last winter.
Joey Gallo, the other all-or-nothing name in the conversation, never got to that kind of payday at all. The Rangers kept him on year-to-year arbitration deals, and after that he settled for a pair of one-year contracts before a move to pitching that has not generated news since February.
Murakami has been much closer to Schwarber than Gallo so far, but August was a reminder that he still hasn’t locked in a true major league baseline. Over 125 plate appearances this past month, he hit .147/.304/.343 and struck out 46 times.
The strikeouts have ticked up slightly, and the contact has gotten messier too, with both his ground-ball rate and pop-up rate moving in the wrong direction. Pitchers have started attacking him inside with more fastballs, and he hasn’t consistently been able to get to his pull power or square up the opposite-field swing at the right launch angle.
Even with that slump, Murakami has remained a clear positive over the full season. He’s still drawing walks, including three on Monday in Houston, one of them with the bases loaded.
His swing decisions, at least in the basic ball-strike sense, are still solid. That helps explain why White Sox coaches haven’t sounded the alarm and why he’s stayed in the two-hole in his last 58 starts dating back to before the hamstring injury.
And really, there isn’t much the White Sox can do if the slump stretches deeper into the season. They don’t have an obvious replacement who brings more promise without creating another hole somewhere else in the lineup. Maybe that changes if Kyle Teel comes back swinging, but for now the White Sox look set to keep riding with the group that got them here.
The financial pressure is not immediate. No matter how Murakami finishes this season, he’s still under contract for $17.5 million in 2027.
After that, the White Sox are looking at a blank payroll, with Andrew Benintendi and Luis Castillo coming off the books. The hope is that the front office adds the right kind of depth this coming offseason.
For the moment, though, the only 2028 commitment is Anthony Kay’s $2 million buyout, and the only major salary to account for is Miguel Vargas in his second arbitration year. If Schwarber is the model, the White Sox should have the room to avoid being boxed out.
There are plenty of reasons to believe this could just play out quietly. The White Sox have never signed a nine-figure contract, and the franchise has a way of making cynics feel justified. But with CBA uncertainty looming, the possibility of a stronger draw at the gate, and the Justin Ishbia transition window getting closer as new ballpark plans get worked through, there are more moving parts than usual.
Even so, the cleanest outcome may be the simplest one: let the original contract run its course and see where it goes. In that sense, an extension would actually introduce more questions than the current setup does.
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