The White Sox probably won't trade Korey Lee until they absolutely have to, and with Kyle Teel exiting the sixth inning of Team Italy's 8-6 upset of Team USA on Tuesday night with what's being called right hamstring discomfort, that date might be pushed back a little while longer.
Teel started limping halfway shortly after rounding first on what should've been a stand-up double down the right-field line. Instead, he had to flop into second base to get there safely, and pounded the ground in frustration afterward.
The injury cut short an outstanding evening for Teel, who flipped a 96-mph Nolan McLean fastball into the Crawford Boxes at Houston's Daikin Park for a second-inning solo shot, then drew a walk and scored in the fourth. Throw in his strong opening performance against Brazil on Saturday, and he started the WBC 4-for-6 with a homer, double and a walk.
Now we'll see if he gets a chance to finish it, but my guess is that the White Sox have seen enough. During his postgame presser, Italy manager Francisco Cervelli was already resigned to replacing Teel on the roster with bullpen catcher Andres Annunziata for Wednesday night’s game against Mexico.
The good news is that catcher is one of the few positions where the White Sox are able to absorb a minor injury to a front-line starter. Edgar Quero is batting .367/.386/.533 and leading the team in hits this Cactus League, while Lee continues to make his case for Baseball's Most Compelling Third Catcher. He's 6-for-22 with a homer and two doubles over nine games while leading the team in walks (seven) and stolen bases (four in four attempts). There's also the secondary effects of easing the logjam at DH, so while any Teel absence would be a bummer given the expectations everybody has for his sophomore season, the Sox have ways of making it productive.
Perhaps the lesson is to not have an espresso machine in the dugout, because coffee is a mild diuretic. Frank Thomas could tell them that, if only he and the club were on speaking terms.
Sam Antonacci is running wild
Like Teel, Sam Antonacci homered off 96 mph from McLean in the second, bringing his hands in on an elevated fastball and hoisting it over the right-center wall to expand Italy's lead to 3-0.
Unlike Teel, Antonacci continues to experience no adverse affects from going full tilt.
While it'll still take some time to determine how much of this spring power will carry into the regular season, Antonacci spent the rest of his evening showcasing his traditional hallmarks. Two batters after Teel exited, he hit a tapper back to Brad Keller, but still ended up on second base via hustle after Keller's attempt to start a 1-6-3 ended up in center field. He then advanced to third on a flyout to right, and scored on a not-that-wild pitch that inspired John Smoltz to issue a Hawk Superlative.
Capping off the Sam Slam, Antonacci took a pitch in the dirt off his foot in the eighth. He finished his night 1-for-3 with two runs and two RBIs. After posting a White Sox-leading 1.346 OPS over six Cactus League games before departing for (Team) Italy, he's managed to top it over his first two WBC games (1.375).
Hell, Antonacci was even rolling postgame. Just look at this:
We all have the same mindset. We don't really need all the bells and whistles. We're just kind of a gritty group, I would say. And we just love playing baseball.
And I think that showed tonight and just doing the little things right and just wanting to win. We're here to win, we're here to play, and we're just here for the love of the game.
And this:
Just the same game. I mean, we're all human. We're all out there playing the same game. We all woke up this morning, had breakfast, all doing the same thing. So at the end of the day, it's just who wants it more, and today I think we showed that a little bit more and made the plays got a couple of bigger hits than they did and ultimately just won.
Munetaka Murakami breaks through
In comparison to his Italian counterparts, it's been a much quieter start to the WBC for Munetaka Murakami. But while he went 1-for-5 with two strikeouts against a winless Team Czechia on Tueday, he maxed out that line with a grand slam off Ryan Johnson that capped off Japan's nine-run eighth-inning outburst that produced the expected rout, even if it took the scenic route.
The pitch came to his bat at 87.3 mph, and left it at 112.1 mph, so it may not be all that instructive with regards to the stuff Murakami will face wearing a White Sox uniform come March 26. But it's definitely something closer to major league velocity than he saw in his second plate appearance against 5-foot-9-inch literal electrician Ondrej Satoria.
