Davis Martin has actually been a bit better against lefties (.645 OPS) than righties (.698 OPS) this season, with neutral platoon splits for his career. Nevertheless, the Guardians will have six lefties and two switch-hitters digging in against him.
As a reporter, there was something darkly amusing about seeing a clutch of users of X, the disinformation app, give attention to a Rotoworld update saying that Munetaka Murakami was day-to-day to return from his hamstring strain. Mainly because Rotoworld itself is just aggregating the reporting of others, and unless their update is tied to an actual coherent source, it's meaningless. But in a clear-cut "tail wags dog" scenario, it spurred a fevered round of requesting an update from the team, which resulted in a new and fresh non-update:
Murakami will go on a Minor League rehab before he returns per Venable. No timetable set yet.
— Scott Merkin (@scottmerkin) July 2, 2026
Long story short: it seems very, very unlikely Murakami returns prior to the All-Star break.
TV: CHSN
Radio: ESPN 1000 AM
Lineups:
| Guardians | White Sox | |
|---|---|---|
| Travis Bazzana, 2B | 1 | Sam Antonacci, LF |
| Chase DeLauter, DH | 2 | Miguel Vargas, 3B |
| Kyle Manzardo, 1B | 3 | Kyle Teel, C |
| Khalil Watson, RF | 4 | Andrew Benintendi, DH |
| Brayan Rocchio, SS | 5 | Colson Montgomery, SS |
| Cooper Ingle, LF | 6 | Braden Montgomery, RF |
| Gabriel Arias, 3B | 7 | Chase Meidroth, 2B |
| Patrick Bailey, C | 8 | Tristan Peters, CF |
| Steven Kwan, CF | 9 | Jacob Gonzalez, 1B |
| Slade Cecconi | SP | Davis Martin |
