Adam Eaton to have arthroscopic surgery on left shoulder

Adam Eaton will have arthroscopic surgery Monday to clean up a left shoulder that has bothered him for much of the season.

The White Sox center fielder, who was out of the lineup for the Sox’ final game of the season, finished strong after a slow start. With a .287/.361/.431 slash line, Eaton was one of the Sox top two productive offensive players along with Jose Abreu. From the leadoff spot, he hit 14 homers, drove in 56 runs despite not having an RBI in April and had 98 runs scored.

Eaton batted .333 in the second half.

“I guess just some scheduled maintenance,” said Eaton, who will undergo a nerve decompression procedure. “It’s scheduled tomorrow and should be a pretty easy recovery.”

Eaton bats left and throws left. He banged the shoulder attempting a diving catch in Cleveland in July and aggravated it in August.

“Just to make sure my muscles are functioning properly and I don’t have any pain,” he said of the clean-up procedure. “I’m excited to sleep better and be able to put my hand above my shoulder in the future.”

Eaton was batting .186 with no RBI on May 9. After signing a contract extension during spring training, he put pressure on himself to prove that he was deserving and his performance suffered, he said.

“To come and have the worst month of my career it was tough on me individually,” he said. “But you know, it was nice to be able to come back and continue to work hard and keep the vision that I can play in this league at the big league level.

”It was nice to come back, have a good year, have some good power numbers, get on base at a decent clip. Getting almost 100 runs. I think if I clean up my running on the basepaths, controlled aggression and understand when to take the extra base, I think I’ll have 100-plus. With the year Jose had, there’s no reason I shouldn’t get 100 runs.”Eaton said he will strive to be a better baserunner and that he’s still in the learning stages of becoming a better overall player. He said the players’ level of disappointment in the team’s disappointing fourth-place finish is great.“We’re getting scrutinized, the whole team up and down and Robin [Ventura] and everybody, we’re doing our darnedest to put a good product out there and it hurts,” he said. “And no one feels worse than the guys in this clubhouse. We know the city of Chicago and the fans deserve better. When we can’t produce it tears us up, trust me.”