5 Chicago White Sox players who must step up with Eloy, Moncada, and Robert Jr. dealing with injuries

The Chicago White Sox are 11 games into the season and are already without three of their best hitters.

Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert Jr. are both on the 10-day IL with soft tissue injuries. Yoan Moncada will be joining them on the injured list soon after he exited Tuesday's game with a left adductor strain. That is the same injury that has Eloy on the 10-day IL.

You have to wonder how these three players are taking care of their bodies since they all tend to spend time on the IL.

Robert Jr. is expected to miss about two months. Eloy says he is starting to feel better and is doing the work to return to the lineup as soon as he can. The White Sox will get an official diagnosis on Moncada after doing more tests on Wednesday.

Needless to say, the Sox must go through some time without their best player in Robert Jr., their best pure power hitter in Eloy, and their current best hitter in Moncada.

That means five players must step up in their absence...

Andrew Vaughn

He is off to a slow start with a .205/.279/.231 slash line, no home runs, a wRC+ of 53, and -.2 fWAR. Vaughn must get out of this funk as he is one of the few consistent power bats the Sox have left in the lineup.

This is the moment for him to finally reach his immense potential. So far potential is all Vaughn has been. In reality, he has been nothing more than a replacement-level player.

The team needs more out of him especially since he plays first base which has been an iconic position for the organization ever since Paul Konerko took over as the starter at the turn of the century and then passed it off to Jose Abreu.

Gavin Sheets

Unlike Vaughn, the power-hitting left-handed bat is off to a good start. He has a .273/.429/.500 slash line with 176 wRC+ and one dinger in 28 at-bats.

The White Sox are going to need him to continue to hit well as he is covering the DH spot in the lineup while Eloy is out.

Lenyn Sosa, Nicky Lopez, and Braden Shewmake

Those three are going to have to man third base while Moncada is out. Sosa moved over to third in yesterday's game when Moncada went out. He has always been one of the team's highly-rated prospects before this season, but he has never been able to carve out any consistent playing time.

When he has gotten his moments, he has struggled to hit in the big leagues. Sosa is off to a 3-for-10 start since he was called up. This is his chance to show what he can do.

Shewmake has never played third, but he made the club out of spring training as the utility infielder. Even if he does not man the hot corner, he is going to have to cover second base if Lopez is moved over to third.

He has been rotating with Lopez and Paul DeJong at shortstop and second base. So far he has made some costly errors. He must cut down on those mistakes and also produce some hits. Lopez also has to help produce at the plate and in the field if he plays the hot corner while Moncada is out.