Andrew Benintendi Has Unfortunate Distinction Entering Red Sox-White Sox Series

When the Red Sox and White Sox open a four-game series Thursday in Chicago, Andrew Benintendi is probably hoping he can get on the right path against his old team.

It’s going to take a lot of work.

The White Sox are by far the worst team in baseball and are on pace to go down as an all-time awful club. They enter the series with the other Sox on a 13-game losing streak. Their 15-47 record puts them 26 games behind the first-place Cleveland Guardians with 10 games separating the fourth-place Tigers and the South Siders.

The White Sox have a lot of problems outside of the former Red Sox star, but the outfielder isn’t helping matters. He has played in 51 games this season for Chicago and currently is hitting .195 with just four home runs and 18 RBIs. His OPS+ is currently 47, a stat in which 100 is league average.

It gets even crazier. Benintendi’s bat-to-ball skills haven’t betrayed him, as evidenced by his 17.5% strikeout rate. What’s wild, though, is his batting average in balls in play (.217) is higher than his batting average (.195), so it’s not like he’s getting unlucky. He’s making hard contact just 23.7% of the time. That number got as high as 38% earlier in his career.

Defense has also been an issue. Only three position players in baseball have worse defensive runs saved metric than Benintendi.

Add it all up, and it’s no surprise that Benintendi’s wins above replacement — minus-1.6 at Fangraphs — is the lowest of any qualified position player in baseball.

Adding injury to insult, Benintendi will miss the Boston series after going on the injured list earlier this month. The outfielder is dealing with an Achilles injury, leaving a game the inning after hitting a home run against Milwaukee last week.

Benintendi is in the second season of a five-year contract he signed in December 2022 (after the Red Sox reportedly checked in, too). The $75 million deal is the largest the White Sox have ever paid a player, a deal he signed a year after earning an All-Star Game selection as a member of the Kansas City Royals.