Chicago White Sox: Nick Madrigal’s first career HR comes in huge win

Nick Madrigal just doesn’t hit for a lot of power. He makes his money by being a pure contact specialist. If he didn’t hit a single home run during the 2021 regular season, not a single person would have said a word. That is why his first career home run on Monday night was extra special. It came in a huge 16-4 Chicago White Sox victory over the Minnesota Twins. It was as fun of a win as the White Sox have had over the Twins in years.

Nick Madrigal’s first career home run was huge for the Chicago White Sox.

Nick’s first career home run was a big one as it put the White Sox ahead 4-1 over the Twins. From that point on, the onslaught was on. It was a huge night for him in general as he had three hits total and one walk. Seeing a player like Madrigal hit second is clearly much better for the White Sox lineup. He truly has the potential to have a special career if he keeps up play like this.

The biggest hit on the scoreboard, however, has the be the grand slam hit by Danny Mendick. It was that blast that pretty much put the game out of reach for the Minnesota Twins. Dallas Keuchel, Jose Ruiz, and Garrett Crochet locked down the Minnesota offense in a great win.

The White Sox are now 25-15. The Cleveland Indians lost their game against the Los Angeles Angels so the White Sox now holds a 3.5 game lead in the American League Central. That is the biggest gap between a first and second-place team in all of Major League Baseball right now. The White Sox have the best record in the league and the highest run differential. It is certainly a good run that they are on right now.

Nick Madrigal isn’t going to hit for power every night but the White Sox need to take advantage of the days that he does. They definitely did that on Monday night. The rest of the series isn’t going to be easy either. The Twins are still the Twins regardless of what their record says. They had a position player pitching so don’t be surprised if they come into Tuesday’s game very angry.

Yermin Mercedes hit a huge home run on a 3-0 count up big off a position player and the Minnesota people weren’t too happy with that either. You might remember a similar situation with Fernando Tatis Jr. last season because people in baseball don’t like fun. It should surprise nobody if Yermin takes a pitch tonight which is horrible for the game of baseball. Hopefully, nobody gets hurt. The White Sox just needs to focus on winning.