Japanese Slugger Munetaka Murakami to Join White Sox

New York, Dec. 21 (Jiji Press)–Japanese slugger Munetaka Murakami, posted for his potential move to U.S. Major League Baseball, has agreed to sign a two-year, 34-million-dollar contract with the Chicago White Sox, the team announced Sunday. The 25-year-old star from the Tokyo Yakult Swallows, a Japanese professional baseball team, will wear No. 5 at the White Sox. Murakami’s posting period for possible negotiations with all 30 MLB teams was to expire at 5 p.m. Monday Eastern Standard Time. About 6.58 million dollars will be paid to the Swallows, a Central League team, for the transfer, according to U.S. media. The White Sox, a team in the American League Central Division, has been struggling in recent years, losing more than 100 games for three consecutive seasons through 2025. Among former Japanese players who belonged to the White Sox are right-handed pitcher Shingo Takatsu, who served as Swallows manager until the 2025 season, as well as Tadahito Iguchi and Kosuke Fukudome. Murakami, a native of Kumamoto Prefecture, southwestern Japan, joined the Swallows as the team’s first-round draft pick for 2017 and was named the Central League’s rookie of the year in 2019. He won the league’s MVP award in the 2021 and 2022 seasons. In 2022, Murakami, who throws right and bats left, slugged 56 home runs, the most by a Japanese player in a single regular season, and became the youngest player at 22 to win all three major batting titles in either league of the Nippon Professional Baseball Organization (NPB), also scoring a batting average of .318 and driving in 134 RBIs. This year, he appeared in only 56 games due to injury, but hit 22 homers. During his eight seasons as a professional player, he appeared in 892 regular season games, batting .270, slugging 246 home runs and scoring 647 RBIs. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]