The Chicago White Sox need to keep Christian Yelich cooled off if they want to win.
Make no mistake about it, Christian Yelich is one of the very best players in all of baseball. There are even people out there that believe that he is the second-best player, only to Mike Trout. You may or may not disagree with those people but it is certainly very hard to argue against him at least being in the conversation. Well, the Chicago White Sox has to deal with him this week and they need to make sure he stays quiet.
The first two games are going to be played in Milwaukee and the next two will be back in Chicago to complete a total of four games. To be honest with you, Yelich has had an awful start to the season. Something just doesn’t quite seem right with him and it would be nice if the White Sox could keep it that way. They only have to deal with him for these four games and then he will be out of their hair unless they somehow faced off in the World Series.
Yelich has been so bad to start the year that he is actually at a -0.6 WAR right now. According to that statistic, the Milwaukee Brewers would have been better off with a replacement-level player in their lineup instead of Yelich so far this season. This is a guy who finished first for the National League MVP in 2018 and in second for 2019.
He only has one hit and it was a home run against the Chicago Cubs in game number two. He only has three RBIs and two of them came from the home run. The one run he has scored was also from the one home run. All of those glorious numbers add up to a slash line of .037/.071/.148. As good as this seems for the Sox, it feels like it is also bad.
A player like Yelich just doesn’t stay bad like that. He is going to break out at any time here. He already hit a home run against the Sox in the final exhibition game. The White Sox absolutely need to do their best to keep him contained for one more series. Carlos Rodon, Lucas Giolito, Dallas Keuchel, and Gio Gonzalez will be the men leading the charge against the Milwaukee offense. This is going to be a lot of fun to watch as they look to extend their winning streak past four games.