CHICAGO — Michael Chavis belted two home runs and a double to help lead the Red Sox 15-2 over the White Sox on Saturday here at Guaranteed Rate Field.

The 23-year-old power hitter, who made his major league debut April 20, already has two more home runs than J.D. Martinez has hit this season. He also has the longest Red Sox home run (459 feet) of 2019 so far.

Chavis went 4-for-6 with two homers, a double, three runs and three RBIs on Saturday. The 2014 first-round draft pick is batting .354 with a .466 on-base percentage, .771 slugging percentage, 1.237 OPS, six home runs, two doubles and 13 RBIs in 14 games.

MassLive.com’s Christopher Smith went one-on-one with Chavis on Friday to discuss several topics, including his power, an early minor league slump, his photo with lemurs, living out of a suitcase, not having enough socks, the book he has with him in the dugout and much more:

Smith: You’re always writing in your book in the dugout during games. What exactly do you write down?

Chavis: "At the beginning of every series, I have like a pitchers’ page. I go through it. And every time I face a pitcher, I write how I saw him and how I saw his pitches. Stuff like that. I do every at-bat of every game. So after the at-bat. Sometimes I’ll have two at-bats and I’ll go back and do both of them (write about both).

“But I’ll write how I saw the pitcher, my swing thoughts, my approach, what I was feeling. Stuff like that. So it just kind of gives me a track record to look back.”

Smith: Is that something the Red Sox told you to do in the minors? Or when did you start it?

Chavis: “It’s something I did on my own, honestly. I did it because when I was in high school, just for me to study, I’d read stuff a million times and I wouldn’t remember it. I had to write it down. So there would be a lot of times when I would be hitting and I would have three cues that I wanted to think about (later). And then I’d get out and I’d be like, ‘Crap, I forgot one.’ So I just started doing this so I could remember cues. And I just started building and using it as a tool.”

Smith: Is there a lot more information you’re taking in here than in the minors?

Chavis: “Definitely. The video is one of the biggest things. There’s video on absolutely everything you can look for. But in regards to what I’m doing with my book, it’s all the same. I’m just trying to stay consistent with that. I’ve kind of found a pretty good routine of what works and what information I like to use. When I first started doing it, I needed three pages a game and I’d just have an overwhelming amount of information.”

Smith: Are you into launch angle and knowing your exit velocities and hit probabilities?

Chavis: “Not really, honestly. I understand it. And I know why some guys use it and why some guys like it more than others. But for me, I naturally kind of have a little bit of loft in my swing. So if I hit the barrel, it’s going to have the launch angle to go. So it’s not something I really worry about too much. It just depends on the guy and their swing."

Smith: You’re not the tallest guy (5-foot-10) in the world like Mookie Betts. What in your swing helps you to generate a lot of power? Betts has such quick hands.

Chavis: "I think my quick hands have a lot to do with it. That’s just one of those things that I was gifted with ever since I was a kid. Swing a baseball bat, everybody said I had quick hands. Asked what I did for it, it’s just one of those God-given gifts.

“I think another thing, Mookie does it as well. He uses his legs really well. And I think that’s one of the things I really focus on. They’re the strongest part of your body. So you’ve obviously got to use them to generate power from the ground up, for throwing and running, everything. So I think I just use my legs pretty well.”

Michael Chavis has his mom's initials (DMN) tattoed on his arm. "She's from New York so she's pretty stubborn so she never dropped her last name," Chavis said back in 2016. "I think it's hilarious."

Smith: You spent five years in the minors. Was there any point in the minors where you thought, “I don’t know if I’m going to make it to the majors.”

Chavis: “I thought about that in the GCL (Gulf Coast League) a couple times. Just the first year in pro ball.”

Smith: But your numbers weren’t that bad in the GCL, right? (.269/.347/.425/.772, 39 games).

Chavis: “They weren’t that bad in the end. When I started I was 4-for-56. I mean, it was hell, man. Honestly, it was one of the toughest years of my life. Away from the field, everything. Because I was 18 years old. Learning to live away from my family. I’m missing my family. I’m not playing well.

"Everything was just amiss. I was really uncomfortable. ... But after that kind of hump of like the 56 (at-bats) or whatever, I kind of turned it around.

“It was just kind of process-thing. It’s just so much of a learning curve, dude. A lot of it was just trying to prove why I was a first-rounder instead of just playing. It wasn’t fun. I’ll be honest with you.”

Smith: The Red Sox have a couple talented third basemen at Greenville (Low A). Triston Casas who was a first-round pick last year. And I don’t know if you know much about Brandon Howlett who also was drafted last year.

Chavis: “He’s a good ballplayer.”

Smith: Yeah, he hit well in the GCL. The numbers haven’t been there for them quite yet in Greenville. But it can’t be easy to play in that league one year after high school, right? It’s sort of inevitable you’re going to struggle some.

Chavis: “It’s a big jump, too. I went from the GCL to Greenville. It’s the first time playing in front of fans. It’s the first time playing in a stadium. Little things like that. I was scared to throw the ball in the stands to hurt somebody when I was playing defense. Like it’s little stuff like that. You’ve just got to get used to playing.”

Smith: Explain this photo to me from Instagram (see photo below)?

Chavis: "OK, so we’re in Miami for the rookie development camp. And we go to the beach, me and my girlfriend. And we’re just hanging out, and I see this guy on a bicycle. And on his bicycle, he has one of those front racks, I guess you can call it. And he has two lemurs. They are literally just sitting there and he’s riding down the street. I’m like, ‘What is happening?’

“So we flagged him down and we were like, ‘Dude, what are you doing?’ And he was like, ‘These are my pets.’ And I’m like, ‘OK, but why?’ And we just started talking to the dude. He’s like, ‘Usually we charge for pictures but you all seem cool.’ They let us take a picture with them, hang out with them. They did tricks. It was cool. It was really cool, honestly.”

Smith: How were you brave enough to do that? They look like they would bite.

Chavis: “I don’t know. I think they do. He said at home he had those two and four more. And he said those were the only two that were nice enough to play with. He said the other ones literally would bite you and attack you just because. And I was like, ‘What?’ Because I always wanted a monkey or a lemur or something like that. But I don’t know. That’s a little different.”

Smith: Marcus Walden is living in a hotel right now. What’s your living situation?

Chavis: “Exact same.”

Smith: So you have a lease on a place in Pawtucket?

Chavis: Yep. So I’m trying to figure that out. I don’t have my truck. I’ve been living out of my suitcase for the whole time I’ve been up here. I’ve had a couple T.J. Maxx runs to get underwear, socks. Because when I got called up, we (Triple-A Pawtucket) were on a three-day road trip. Essentially it was only two days because we were coming back on the last day. So I only packed enough clothes and stuff for that little road trip."

Smith: Has your girlfriend gone back home?

Chavis: “She had to go back home for finals. So she’ll be back in a week-ish.”

Smith: Which college?

Chavis: “Kennesaw State in Georgia.”

Smith: When she was here with your mom, did you guys do anything fun around Boston or were you just too busy with baseball?

Chavis: “It’s literally just been coming to the ballpark for the reason that I don’t have a car. And also, it’s just been so busy. I didn’t really know the schedule and how everything worked into the day. So I was just trying to figure out what I’m doing.

“But when we came up in 2017, when I got the (Red Sox minor league offensive) Player of the Year, my mom, girlfriend and sister and I, one of the nights we went into a Boston horror tour. My sister’s a lawyer. Obviously she’s into that kind of stuff. And it went through all the murderers and the history of Boston and stuff like that. It was really cool.”

Smith: Several prospects you played with have been traded. Just look at your (2015) Greenville team. We were talking yesterday about Yoan Moncada and Michael Kopech being on that team.

Chavis: “Dude, I didn’t even think about that. It’s like the entire team. Like Dubey (Mauricio Dubon), (Nick) Longhi, (Javier) Guerra, Kopech, Basabe (both brothers). Victor Diaz. Oh, my goodness. I didn’t even think about that.”

Smith: At that time, during trade deadlines back then, did you think you might be traded, too?

Chavis: “At that time it was something I thought about. Which is one of the things where I had to grow up. During that time period. Like 2015, 2016. I was still trying to learn how everything worked. And trade deadlines and all that trade talk. I always paid attention to it, trying to figure out what was going to happen in my future. At the end of the day it didn’t matter. So it kind of messed me up where I would try and perform either enough to stay or to prove that I should stay, or something like that. So I’ve kind of gotten to the point where I try not to pay attention to that stuff now.”

Why is name on Twitter, Chief Chavis? Chavis explained to MassLive.com in 2016: “My dad is full-blood Cherokee Indian,” he said. “So growing up, he was always Chief and I was always Little Chief. So now that I’ve become a little bit older, I’m ... ‘The Chief’ and it’s just kind of stuck. Everybody just always called us ‘Chief’ and it just kind of stuck. So I figured one day I’d just go ahead and put it up there.”