Yoán Moncada has been ruled out for three to six months with a left adductor strain, which means his Chicago White Sox career could be over.
Moncada is the third White Sox hitter to get injured while running to first base through the first 11 games of a dreadful season and the second to strain his left adductor muscle in his thigh. All three of the injured players were supposed to be the middle-of-the-order hitters for a World Series contender.
Little has worked out as planned.
It all started this year when Eloy Jiménez pulled up lame after hitting a ground ball against the Detroit Tigers on March 31. On April 5, Luis Robert hobbled after rounding first on a double.
The Sox waited five days but eventually put Jiménez on the 10-day injured list with a left adductor strain. There isn’t a timetable for the return of the oft-injured Jiménez, but it could be fairly soon.
As for Robert, the team’s best player, he was put on the 10-day IL with a Grade 2 right hip flexor strain and is expected to miss six to eight weeks. A White Sox source told The Athletic they would wait to see how he responds to treatment before deciding if Robert needed to go on the 60-day IL. The White Sox recalled outfielder Oscar Colás to replace Moncada and infielder Lenyn Sosa to replace Robert on the active roster.
Not long ago, the trio were billed as the future of the White Sox as the organization embarked on an audacious rebuild aimed at emulating the crosstown Cubs’ run to the 2016 World Series. The rebuild didn’t work out, resulting only in quick playoff exits in 2020 and 2021 and then a nosedive to the bottom of the AL. Moncada, Jiménez and Robert have played together in less than 30 percent of the team’s games due to a variety of injuries. The team’s fortunes have suffered along with them.
According to https://t.co/G34Or1fW3B research, done back on Feb. 19, the trio of Eloy Jimenez, Luis Robert Jr. and Yoan Moncada had played together in 158 of 546 games since the debut of Robert Jr. in 2020 entering 2024 season. They played together in the first 3 in 2024.
— Scott Merkin (@scottmerkin) April 10, 2024
Last season, the two executives in charge of baseball operations, Kenny Williams and Rick Hahn, were fired and replaced by farm director, and former Sox infielder, Chris Getz, who is now the GM of another rebuild.
The Sox were expected to be bad this season, but they have won just two of their first 11 games and been shut out four times. Before a 7-5 win in Cleveland on Tuesday, they had scored just 16 runs in 10 games.
Tuesday’s game might’ve been it for Moncada’s Sox career. Formerly the top prospect in baseball, the Cuban native came over from the Boston Red Sox in the Chris Sale trade at the 2016 Winter Meetings.
After a stellar 2019 season, Moncada signed a five-year, $70 million extension one week before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world. He hasn’t produced much since and only played in 104 games in 2022 and 92 last season. He has a club option for $25 million (with a $5 million buyout) next year.
As for the White Sox, they could conceivably set the franchise record for losses in a season, which currently belongs to the 1970 team that went 56-106. Last year, the team lost 101 games, which is tied for the third-worst mark in the team’s long history.
(Photo of Moncada: Jason Miller / Getty Images)
