Yoan Moncada Is Back And Better Than Ever For The White Sox
The White Sox are just four games into the 2023 regular season, but Yoan Moncada has already recorded three doubles, two home runs, eight hits, and one walk. By the end of the opening series in Houston, he was the talk of the town.
“Moncada, we couldn’t get him out the whole series,” Astros manager Dusty Baker said. “You get a guy like that, that’s hot in the middle of the lineup; hopefully, our middle of the lineup can get equally as hot the next series.”
Moncada stepped up to the plate for his first at-bat of the season, sporting a new look. Bright neon green hoes that matched nothing on his uniform except the bright neon green tape on the handle of his bat. The shoes may have been different, but the results were the same. Reminiscent of the Moncada of old.
Moncada went 8-for-18 on the weekend with four RBIs. He put an exclamation point on his performance on Sunday. Moncada doubled on a line drive to right field off Luis Garcia in his first at-bat, then ripped a ball down the line for another double in his second plate appearance in the top of the sixth inning. He would then come around to score the White Sox second run of the game.
Moncada wasn’t done, however. In the top of the ninth, he took an outside changeup to the opposite field, poking it 362 feet and over the left-center field fence for a two-run homer. Moncada’s second homer of the series provided the White Sox with some key insurance runs in a 6-3 victory.
“He’s seeing the ball really well,” Pedro Grifol said after the White Sox loss on Saturday. “Moncada is playing really good baseball with a lot of energy.”
His performance wasn’t against some guys that will be bagging groceries in a few months during Spring Training, either. It was against the defending World Series champions.
Moncada warned the rest of the baseball world what he was capable of while representing Cuba during the World Baseball Classic. As it turned out, he was providing a preview for the start of the MLB season.
Moncada batted a team-high .435 with a 1.258 OPS, five RBIs in six games, four doubles, and a home run. The 27-year-old carried Cuba in for much of the tournament. Against Panama, he went 3-for-5 with four RBIs and a walk. Then in a crucial game against Chinese Taipei, he went 3-for-4 with a home run, double, and two runs scored. For his final act in round-robin play, he delivered a two-hit, two-walk performance, including a double and a run scored to help Cuba advance to the semifinals. He became the first player from the White Sox to be recognized in the WBC’s All-Tournament Teams after receiving a first-team selection.
Producing like that with the world watching gave Moncada a much-needed confidence boost.
“I’ve been able to carry that momentum to the season,” Moncada told reporters earlier in the Astros series. “I’ve been working the same way.”
His energy and balanced attack at the plate give fans flashbacks to his fabled 2019 season when he batted .315 with 25 homers and 79 RBIs. He became one of just three players in the MLB that season to hit .300 with 30 plus doubles, 25 plus runs, 75 plus RBIs, and ten plus steals, while simultaneously showing everyone the star player the White Sox thought they were getting when they traded Chris Sale.
This hasn’t even included what he has done on the defensive end. Moncada has been stellar at third base, highlighted by a pair of dazzling defensive plays. On Opening Day, he made a charging barehanded grab and then threw out Jeremy Pena on the run to end the eighth inning. On Sunday, he made another impressive play after pouncing on a Mauricio Dubon bunt in the second inning.
It is way too early in the season to start jumping to conclusions. But there is very little to gripe about with Moncada’s play. In Houston, we saw the power and average he displayed in 2019, the discipline he showed in 2021, and the Gold Glove-caliber defense at third base we witnessed for most of the 2022 campaign.
It’s hard not to be excited about what’s in store the rest of the way.