SURPRISE, Ariz. – Tommy White was no stranger to the multihomer game in college. He had five in his one season with NC State alone and seven more across his two years at LSU, the most recent one coming on May 18, 2024 — his final regular-season home game as a Tiger.
A second-round pick by the A’s last year, White had 125 professional games under his belt between Single-A, High-A, Double-A and the Arizona Fall League entering Saturday; all of them without multiple dingers.
The Athletics’ No. 7 prospect went deep twice and added seven RBIs in Mesa’s 11-10, 10-inning win at Surprise on Saturday. It marked the third multihomer game of the 2025 AFL season following similar efforts by Esmerlyn Valdez (PIT No. 15) and Jack Hurley (D-backs), both of Salt River.
“Take what you can get. Barrels all day,” White said. “Just do what you can do with each pitch. It’s not like I’m trying to hit multi-home run games all the time, but it’s definitely awesome when they come.”
The right-handed slugger didn’t have to wait long in the matinee to flex his pop. He connected on the first pitch he saw from Royals right-hander Logan Martin in the first inning – an 86.3 mph cutter up in the zone and over the outer half – and sent it out to straightaway center for his first long ball of the Fall League on a two-run shot.
That set the tone quickly for the Solar Sox cleanup hitter, who kept his momentum going during his second trip to the plate in the second frame. With the bases loaded, White worked a 2-1 count against Phillies righty Jaydenn Estanista before getting a 95 mph fastball well within the zone that he crushed the opposite way for a grand slam.
The exit velocities on the two blasts were 104.0 and 104.8 mph, respectively, making them White’s hardest-hit balls of the AFL to that point. That was usurped by a 106.7 mph grounder in the fourth inning, and White rounded out his day with a single through the right side in the 10th for what proved to be the winning RBI.
It was a much-needed performance for the 2023 Men’s College World Series champion. He entered the weekend hitless in his previous five games for Mesa, going 0-for-17 in that stretch. White turned focus to his cage work in hopes of finding a solution that would deliver results, any results, whether they left the yard or not.
“Shortening up a little bit,” he said. “Not trying to jump towards the ball, maybe, or catch it too early or anything. … I was just swinging the bat at the wrong pitches early, I would say. [I’m] trying to find the pitch that I can handle and the one that I want, not the one that they give me.”
There is certainly some backing for that adjustment. Entering Saturday, White was running a 45 percent chase rate (per Synergy Sports) through his first seven games. He could still put the bat on the ball — even during that 0-for-17 run, he struck out just three times — but it kept him from finding the loud results that made him a college star and prominent Draft pick.
Striking that balance between the hit and power tools also defined his late-season run with Double-A Midland, where he batted .311 with just a 15 percent strikeout rate but also managed only one homer in 27 games. He didn’t go deep in his five postseason contests in the Texas League either.
“I don’t really try to really set a goal on a number of home runs I want to hit during the year,” White said. “It’s just that I want to win baseball games. So if I can do whatever I can to win a baseball game, then I’ve done my job for that day. It’s not, ‘Oh, I hit five home runs, but our team went, you know, .300 on the year.’ That’s not going to play.”
After hitting .275/.334/.439 with 12 homers in 93 games between High-A and Double-A in his first full season, White is still trying to establish his identity in pro ball, especially as he heads toward the Majors. He’s been splitting time with Mesa between third base and first, though Nick Kurtz casts a large shadow at the latter spot and White might be stretched a bit at the hot corner.
The bat will likely do his talking if he’s to push for an MLB spot in 2026. And for a day in 2025, that bat looked as close to its college equivalent as it ever has in pro ball.
“It’s not feeling the power,” White said. “It’s more [that] I feel really confident today.”
