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The White Sox’ entire projected starting outfield for 2021 is on the IL.

HOUSTON — The White Sox lost another outfielder to the injured list Thursday Adam Eaton landed on the 10-day injured list with a strained right hamstring.

Right-hander Zack Burdi was recalled from Triple-A Charlotte to join the team in Houston, where the Sox open a four-game series Thursday night.

Burdi, 26, is 0-2 with a 5.59 ERA and 13 strikeouts over 9 ²⁄₃ relief innings this season at Charlotte. Burdi made one appearance with the Sox on April 19, allowing two runs over three innings against the Red Sox in Boston.

Eaton, 32, has been struggling at the plate after a good start in April, hitting .147 with two homers his last 34 games. He has been dealing with leg issues for much of the season, and missed missed a four-game series against the Orioles in late May with right hamstring tightness.

“I know Adam Eaton is still fighting some soreness in his leg,” manager Tony La Russa said Wednesday.

Signed to one-year, $7 million contract in the offseason, Eaton is batting .195 with five home runs and 14 extra base hits, 27 RBI and 30 runs scored.

“He’s had that [soreness on] and off,” La Russa said Wednesday. “He’s had some leg miseries. He’s a vet, he knows the difference between sore and hurt. He’s played through it, there’s some times we’ve had to back him off. … So when it gets sore you pay attention to it and try to be as careful as you can.”

Eaton’s injury means the entire projected starting outfield coming out of spring training is on the IL, with Eloy Jimenez and and Luis Robert out for at least another month. Billy Hamilton is also on the IL with an oblique strain. Adam Engel, the projected fourth outfielder, injured his hamstring during spring training and didn’t return until this month.

The Sox enter their game Thursday with the best record in baseball, 43-25.

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Amin, who calls the Bulls on NBC Sports Chicago and Bears preseason games for Fox-32, will call the White Sox-Astros game Saturday for Fox with A.J. Pierzynski.

Broadcaster Adam Amin is only a year into his tenure with Fox after almost 10 years at ESPN, but that has been more than enough time to notice a philosophical difference between the networks’ game broadcasts.

“Each assignment that we get is very game-centric,” said Amin, who calls MLB, NFL and college basketball games. “It’s very much focused on the minutia and the overarching storylines of just that game. And if there are storylines that branch out into more of a big picture, we’ll talk about them. But they always take a back seat to what’s happening in front of us.”

“It’s not an indictment of ESPN, but it’s a little bit different calling games at Fox. As a play-by-play announcer, I prefer it this way.”

Amin’s words ring true to those who have been frustrated by ESPN’s insistence on turning “Sunday Night Baseball” into a talk show starring Alex Rodriguez rather than focusing on the game it chose to air.

That isn’t a problem for those watching Fox’s “Baseball Night in America,” which will feature the White Sox on Saturday. Amin will call the game against the Astros from Minute Maid Park in Houston alongside former Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski. It’s the first of three Sox appearances on Fox this season, equaling the team’s total from 2014 to 2020.

It isn’t easy for national announcers to drop in and take over for local announcers, particularly in the eyes and ears of fans. But Amin, who also calls Bulls games for NBC Sports Chicago and Bears preseason games for Fox-32, lives in Chicago and hears all about the Sox. And he certainly has done his homework for the Astros.

“The way I prep for these games, I’m trying to be a local broadcaster,” Amin said. “I’m trying to be as dialed in to the Astros as [Astros TV voice] Todd Kalas, and I’m trying to be as dialed in to the White Sox as [Sox TV voice] Jason Benetti is. That’s the goal.”

That meshes with Fox’s approach to game broadcasts. The network has been a great steward of MLB’s traditional Saturday game of the week, which always has been special to Amin. Growing up in west suburban Addison, he spent Saturdays with his brother and father watching “This Week in Baseball” and whatever game followed on NBC.

“That was a huge deal,” Amin said before singing some of the “TWIB” theme song. “You hear that every single week, and you’re like, ‘I know exactly what time of the day it is, and I know what the next five hours is gonna be.”

In his formative years of becoming a baseball fan, he watched Vin Scully and Joe Garagiola, as well as Bob Costas and Tony Kubek, call the action and focus on the game. That doesn’t mean what happens during the game Saturday won’t lead to a topical discussion, such as MLB’s new ban on foreign substances, which has drawn the ire of many pitchers.

Sox starter Carlos Rodon, who will face the Astros on Friday, is sure to come up. He expressed his frustration with the mandate, telling NBCSCH, “It’s hard to see this when you’re giving out 10-game suspensions for cheating but you give the Astros no suspensions at all [for stealing signs in 2017].”

Plus, Dallas Keuchel is back in Houston, where he spent his first seven seasons and won the Cy Young Award in 2015. He’ll start for the Sox on Sunday, and Amin said Fox requested an in-game interview with him, though there was no guarantee it would happen.

“So we’re going to discuss some national things, obviously,” Amin said, “but I think all of that takes a back seat to, by the way, we’re watching the best team in the American League Central and we’re watching one of the best teams in the AL West and these might be two of the best offenses in baseball.”

Amin will call these teams again for Fox when the Astros visit Guaranteed Rate Field on July 17. The Sox’ third Fox appearance is the “Field of Dreams” game Aug. 12 in Dyersville, Iowa, which figures to be called by the network’s top crew of Joe Buck, John Smoltz and Ken Rosenthal.

No matter who’s playing, Amin is thoroughly enjoying himself at Fox. He has decreased his portfolio and increased his profile, cutting down from numerous sports to three big ones.

“It’s what I had hoped for, to be able to cover these sports at what many would consider to be the highest level,” he said. “It’s broadcast television. The largest audiences for regular-season broadcasts in general, particularly the NFL. I wanted to be a part of that.”

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Two people were shot, one fatally, Thursday morning in Woodlawn on the South Side.

They were standing outside about 8:40 a.m. in the 6200 block of South Evans Avenue when a small gray vehicle drove by and someone inside fired shots, Chicago police said.

A male was shot and taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead, police said.

An 18-year-old man was struck in the abdomen and taken to the same hospital, police said. His condition was not immediately known.

Area One detectives are investigating.

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Last Father’s Day my wife bought me Air Pods Pro, a delightful pair of white ear buds. The sound quality is so pristine it brought tears to my eyes. The devices sleep in their own little sleek white lozenge that closes with a satisfying snap. Just the thing for the dad in your life and only $250.

Walking the dog around my leafy suburban paradise, I wear them, listening to podcasts and audio books and music. They do block out the world, so if Kitty starts straining toward a passing dog, I’ll ask “Is your dog friendly?” while plucking the tiny marvel out of my left ear so I can hear the reply.

Invariably, it is, and we humans chat superficially while our pets exchange sincere sniffs, tails wagging happily away. Then I slip the pod back in and float along like a bubble in the warm current of good feeling that is my life, for the most part.

There was that thin young man who approached me Monday on the three-block stretch that passes for a downtown. He had on the standard summer uniform: shorts, a baggy pastel oxford shirt, untucked. Perhaps more sunburnt than is typical. He could have been 30, could have been 50. Hard to tell in the three seconds I appraised him. He asked me something, I removed my earbud and smiled encouragingly, anticipating his question: sometimes people step off the train and need directions. I love giving directions. It makes me feel so useful.

“Can you buy me some food?” he said.

“No,” I replied curtly, automatically, jamming my Air Pod Pro back into my ear and hurrying away, surprised and rattled. I twisted my head, trying to track him out of the corner of my eye, in case he followed me.

Surprised because the refusal wasn’t me. I’m the sort of guy who would clap him on the back with a hearty “Of course!” and usher him into one of the fine eating establishments all around us. We were in front of Oliveri’s. Excellent lemon chicken. Across the street, Graeter’s, with its French pot process ice cream. That would perk up my new friend, and you’d now be reading the sad tale he’d unspool between bites of hot fudge sundae.

But that didn’t happen.

Parsing why I reacted that way, and whether I had done the right thing, my first thought was: I’m not obligated to underwrite the addiction of any passing junkie who asks me to.

A half-block later I stopped and turned, wondering if perhaps I’d made a mistake. Maybe I should go back and help. But he was gone.

I have a hunch what’s going on here. Looking back over the past year, I can’t help wonder whether compassion fatigue has set in. So much of the news demands you sympathize, or pause to understand, or at least momentarily think about people in circumstances far more difficult than your own. People who seem to be asking something of you. If not money, then time, attention, acceptance, approval.

Empathy is the new Mason-Dixon line. It’s the hoop many Americans won’t even try to jump through. Just the opposite; they seem to define themselves by who they’re not, vigorously trying to squash anybody who isn’t themselves, whether by passing laws to harass transgender youth, using the “Black Lives Matter” outcry as an occasion to remind everyone that THEIR lives matter, first and foremost, or passing laws demanding that history be even more whitewashed than it already is.

Remembering the caustic indifference of others is a welcome kick in the pants. I bobbled this guy, but there’s always another coming down the pike, palm out.

And since people on the left can get confused, just like people on the right, I should point out that I am not equating any group with beggary, other than placing them on the broad spectrum of matters that demand empathy. A realm where I hope to include myself.

Maybe it would help if I point out that the “only $250” in the opening paragraph was sarcastic. That’s a lot of money for a pair of electronic doohickies, more than I would ever spend on myself. That’s why my wife bought them. There are cheaper ear buds, but she knew Apple gear is so well-designed, it makes me proud to be a human being. A feeling hard to gin up nowadays after scanning the headlines.

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Speaking to the Munich Security Conference in February, President Joe Biden proclaimed that “America is back.” It’s a pleasing sentiment, but our allies as well as our adversaries can be forgiven for taking a wait-and-see attitude.

America’s approach to the world has gyrated over the past two decades from George W. Bush’s assertive interventionism to Barack Obama’s lead-from-behind modesty. Donald Trump’s “America First” posture was a mixture of obsequiousness toward dictators and truculence toward traditional allies.

Biden attempted to reify the “America is Back” slogan by urging a unified G-7 position toward China. He hoped for a unanimous declaration condemning China’s use of forced labor, and while Canada, Britain and France were ready to sign on, others demurred. It seems likely that the Biden administration will continue to press allies on taking a hard line toward Beijing. He has repeatedly emphasized that confronting China is a defining challenge of his presidency.

“This is a battle between the utility of democracies in the 21st century and autocracies,” he told reporters at his first news conference as president. “We’ve got to prove democracy works.”

America and other free nations have a chance to do something that would earn true admiration and respect from the rest of the world: donate free vaccines. As in trade, development and technology, we would be competing directly with China and Russia. Biden has pledged 500 million doses. It’s a start, but we’ve got to think bigger.

When the United States launched the Marshall Plan in 1948, Europe was still devastated by World War II. America offered generous aid to the whole continent, including the Soviet Union and its satellites (they declined). The Marshall Plan took its place, as Winston Churchill said of the Lend-Lease Act, as the “most unsordid act” in world history.

Less well remembered is George W. Bush’s President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief initiative, a program to battle AIDS in Africa, that has saved an estimated 18 million lives. It was the largest effort by any government to fight disease and the largest U.S. government foreign commitment since the Marshall Plan.

There are many goals that are extremely difficult to achieve in foreign policy. It’s tough to get Iran to stop funding terrorists. We’ve tried friendliness (Obama) and harsh sanctions (Trump). Iran remains Iran. North Korea is a disaster. We’ve tried strategic patience (Obama) and fawning friendliness (Trump). North Korea remains nuclear-armed. It’s difficult to try to reform countries in Central America so that their people will not be so desperate as to journey north. It’s hard to get nations to agree to joint action on climate change.

But vaccinating the world is something we can do. Is it expensive? Compared with what? The International Monetary Fund estimates that it would cost $50 billion to vaccinate 70% of the world’s population over the next 10 months. That amounts to just 0.13% of the combined GDPs of the G-7 nations. In Washington, $50 billion is what you find in the sofa cushions.

China and Russia are both offering vaccines to developing nations. But Russia is demanding quid pro quos. In Bolivia, for example, Russia began talks about rare-earth minerals in return for the Sputnik V vaccine. China donated the Sinovac vaccine to Cambodia and Laos … in return for backing China’s position in the South China Sea.

And here’s another potential reason that the U.S. vaccines will be preferred: They work. Though the Russians have claimed a 92% effectiveness rate for their jabs, some have expressed skepticism. A recent Lancet article called the data backing Sputnik into doubt. It seems there’s been a lack of transparency in Russia. Who would have thought?

As for the Chinese vaccine, Sinovac, it’s efficacy is officially put at 50%, compared with over 90% for Pfizer and Moderna. The newly developed Novavax vaccine just clocked in at 90%, too. Nations such as Bahrain that were early adopters of the Chinese vaccine have backed away as their caseloads have risen.

If the United States had nothing to gain from vaccinating the world except the satisfaction of benevolence, it would be well worth it. But our own self-interest would be served as well. As long as the virus spreads, it has opportunities to mutate. So far, the vaccines have proven effective against the known variants, but that may not last. If a more virulent and/or vaccine-resistant strain gets a foothold anywhere in the world, it will be knocking on our door before long.

A U.S.-led effort by wealthy nations to vaccinate the world would play to our strengths. Thanks in part to our openness to brilliant immigrants such as Kati Kariko, who developed mRNA techniques, our breakthroughs continue to dazzle.

Americans like to help. We may disagree vehemently about whether to withdraw from Afghanistan or rejoin the Paris Agreement, but most Americans will, I hope and expect, feel a sense of pride at leading the world to overcome this deadly plague, and doing so with graciousness and a servant’s heart.

Let’s do this. Let’s be “unsordid” again.

Mona Charen is policy editor of The Bulwark and host of the “Beg to Differ” podcast. Her most recent book is “Sex Matters: How Modern Feminism Lost Touch with Science, Love, and Common Sense.”

Send letters to [email protected].

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Authorities responded to the shooting about 11:50 a.m. near 109th and State streets, according to Chicago fire officials.

By

Sun-Times Wire

Jun 17, 2021, 12:47pm CDT

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