Roman Anthony Has Arrived in Boston

The wait is over. On Monday, the Red Sox called up Roman Anthony, the consensus top prospect in baseball. He batted fifth and played right field against the Rays, going 0-for-4 with a walk, an RBI, and a costly error. After spending the last few seasons absolutely torching the minors, it turns out Anthony just needed to smash a 497-foot grand slam – the longest ball hit in either the majors or the minors this season – in order to earn his spot in Boston.

What really brought Anthony to Boston was a left oblique strain to Wilyer Abreu, whom the Red Sox placed on the IL when they announced Anthony’s promotion (though the 497-footer certainly couldn’t have hurt). The team designated Ryan Noda for assignment to open a 40-man roster spot.

After all the anticipation, the promotion happened at the very last minute; there were no tear-jerker undercover boss videos. Although Abreu showed discomfort during Friday’s game against the Yankees, the team wasn’t sure until Monday afternoon that he’d actually need to go on the IL. The Triple-A Worcester Red Sox were on the bus about to head to their next series in the Lehigh Valley when the big club called and asked them to wait. Everybody piled off the bus, but the team’s gear was already en route to Pennsylvania. So Anthony drove up the Mass Pike after getting the news and played the game in borrowed cleats. Luckily, teammate Marcelo Mayer already had one of Anthony’s bats.

The Red Sox could certainly use a savior right about now. At 32-36, they’re in fourth place in the East, nine games behind the Yankees, and 4 1/2 games out of the final Wild Card spot. We currently have them with a 15.7% chance of making the playoffs.

True to form, Anthony didn’t swing at the first pitch in any of his five plate appearances. He started his career with a fly out to left field in the second inning. In the fourth, he rifled a 111.2-mph line drive straight up the middle and off the leg of pitcher Shane Baz. It took a fortunate bounce for the Rays and ended up a 1-5-3 groundout. In the fifth inning, Anthony made a disastrous error, completely whiffing on a routine bouncer and costing the team a run. In the sixth, he struck out looking on a brutal, knee-buckling front-door sweeper from Garrett Cleavinger. It was a welcome-to-the-big-leagues moment. Anthony walked in the seventh inning and knocked in a run on a groundout in the ninth. He was slated to lead off the 11th with the Red Sox trailing by two, but with left-hander Ian Seymour on the mound, he was lifted for pinch-hitter Rob Refsnyder. Boston lost, 10-8.

Although it feels like Sox fans have been waiting on Anthony forever, he only turned 21 last month. The team went into the offseason with a group of prospects who came to be known as the Big Four: Anthony, Kristian Campbell, Mayer, and catcher Kyle Teel. Anthony was the most anticipated of the group, but he was the last to make it to the big leagues. Campbell broke camp with the club despite a dreadful spring training, got off to a red-hot start, then cooled off in dramatic fashion. He has a 24 wRC+ since April 30, and some have argued he needs some time in Worcester to figure things out. Shortstop Mayer was called up to play third in the wake of Alex Bregman’s hamstring injury, and has run a 99 wRC+ over 13 games with Boston. Teel went to the White Sox in the Garrett Crochet trade and made his debut on Friday.

The Red Sox selected Anthony out of high school in the second round of the 2022 draft, though his $2.5 million bonus was in line with a late first-round pick. He was considered to be a power-first prospect, but once he got to the minors, he showed more contact ability than expected and began rocketing up industry lists. Here’s what Eric Longenhagen wrote in February, when he ranked Anthony second to Roki Sasaki in the Top 100: “In pro ball, Anthony’s swing has become looser, and more active and kinetic, as his hands build enormous momentum before they explode and break the sound barrier with some of the best bat speed in pro baseball. The whip and looseness of his hips and hands at his size are very special. These changes not only unlocked a new gear of raw power for Anthony… but they also seem to have made him more comfortable and adept at moving the barrel around the zone.”

Anthony made it to Double-A in 2023, running a 140 wRC+ with 14 home runs across three levels. He was even better in 2024, spending 84 games in Double-A and 35 in Triple-A while combining for a 147 wRC+ and 18 homers. Across 58 games in Worcester this season, Anthony hit 10 home runs and ran an absurd 19.2% walk rate en route to a 146 wRC+. His average exit velocity of 95 mph would rank fourth among all qualified major leaguers. As Jarrett Seidler noted for Baseball Prospectus, Anthony has given back some of his contact gains as he’s reached the more difficult pitching of the high minors, but he’s still making enough contact, and the package is a rare combination of power and patience. “At peak,” wrote Eric, “Anthony will be a middle-of-the-order monster posting huge power and on-base percentages.”

A few nits are keeping Anthony in the 60-FV tier, rather than 65 or 70. He tends to swing down on the ball, resulting in more grounders than anyone would like. It’s probably not a coincidence that the one ball he really smoked Monday night was a low liner. He ran a 52.2% groundball rate in Worcester this season.

As Eric noted in February, the adjustment that helped Anthony make more contact on fastballs at the top of the zone also opened up a new hole against breaking and offspeed pitches at the bottom, and he’s still behind on fastballs. Over the past two seasons in Worcester, he’s pulled just 27.2% of the fastballs he’s put into play. Among Triple-A players with at least 100 tracked fastballs in play, that puts him in just the 17th percentile. Once again, though, his hard-hit rate against fastballs puts him in the 99th percentile, and there’s no cozier place than Fenway Park for a left-handed batter who likes to hit the ball the other way.

At times, prospect writers have expressed concerns that Anthony’s walk rate is slightly artificial; they worry he’s so passive that he earns tons of walks against minor league pitchers who don’t have a great feel for the zone, a trick that won’t work as well against major league pitchers. He ran a 35.6% swing rate in Worcester, lower than every qualified major leaguer not named Juan Soto. Over the past two seasons, 229 players have seen at least 400 tracked pitches over the heart of the plate at the Triple-A level. Anthony’s 60.1% swing rate on those pitches ranks 221st among them. Then again, his .460 xwOBA on those pitches ranks second and his average exit velocity of 96.3 mph ranks first.

The 6-foot-3, 200-pound Anthony is destined for an outfield corner, but on a team with fewer options, he might have gotten the chance to start his career in center. Boston’s outfield remains a puzzle, mostly in a good way. The team has gotten 4.8 WAR from its outfielders so far this season, the fifth-highest total in baseball. In Anthony, Abreu, Jarren Duran, and Ceddanne Rafaela, the Red Sox have four young outfielders and no ideal way to put them together. And that’s before you consider Masataka Yoshida, who is still rehabbing his surgically repaired shoulder. Yoshida is ready to hit now, but despite the fact that he’s not a good defender, the Red Sox have insisted he won’t return until he can play in the field. In the meantime, they have given away Yoshida’s DH spot, and it’s looking less and less likely that he’ll find his way back to Boston.

Rafaela is a special defender, but he’s got some of the worst plate discipline ever recorded. There’s no reason to expect him to be even a league-average bat, but as long as he’s not too far from that level, he can be valuable as a glove-first center fielder. In fact, he leads Red Sox outfielders with 1.6 WAR. He’s also the only one of the four with a contract extension, and he’s set to play in Boston through the 2031 season (with a team option for 2032).

Duran is coming off a breakout 6.7-WAR season, but as expected, he has regressed to something approaching a three-win pace this year. While Rafaela was filling in for Trevor Story at shortstop in 2024, Duran filled in brilliantly at center, but this season his defense has taken a step back. Eric has Anthony’s defense ahead of Duran’s right now.

Abreu won a Gold Glove and finished sixth in the Rookie of the Year voting last season, but the Red Sox view him as strictly a platoon player. He got off to a rocket-fueled start this season, running a 154 wRC+ over his first 41 games on the back of a drastically reduced chase rate. However, his chase rate has since exploded and he’s posted a wRC+ of just 20 from May 13 onward. He’s platooning with Refsnyder, who is, for the second season in a row, mashing. Refsnyder is currently slashing .284/.383/.522 for a 145 wRC+.

The team has been vague about Abreu’s injury, and it’s unknown whether he’ll need more than the minimum 10-day IL stint. Even while Abreu is out, it’s not entirely clear what the right move is. Alex Speier of the Boston Globe wrote that manger Alex Cora is “unsure about the frequency with which the lefthanded slugging prospect will be used against lefties.” In other words, it sounds like they’re likely to plug Anthony into Abreu’s platoon with Refsnyder. Said Cora, “Obviously, there’s an adjustment period in the big leagues, and I’m not saying we’re going to ease him into the action, but we understand the [quality of the] at-bat. We’ll mix and match, but I’m happy that he’s here, and I know he’s going to contribute.” It’s hard to imagine calling up the top prospect in baseball only to platoon him, especially since he was crushing lefties in the minors. When I asked Eric about the developmental effect of such a move, he replied it was a reasonable way to get Anthony’s feet wet, but it should only last as long as the team has a shot at the playoffs. It’s hard to justify keeping Refsnyder, arguably the best-hitting outfielder on the team, on the bench, especially when his contract is expiring. Sitting him now would hurt his trade value at the deadline.

Things will only get more complicated once Abreu returns. It wouldn’t be shocking to see Duran in center with Rafaela in a lesser role as a pinch-runner and defensive specialist, but then again, Rafaela has been Boston’s most valuable outfielder this season. It’s also possible the Red Sox could attempt to trade someone to clear the logjam, especially if they see themselves as sellers at the deadline. The simplest answer would be to platoon Rafaela and Abreu next season, shifting Duran to center against lefties. The downside of that plan is Rafaela doesn’t hit lefties all that well, either.

Regardless of how things shake out, finding room for Anthony in a crowded outfield is a problem that any team would love to have. And we’ll get some answers when the Yankees arrive in Boston on Thursday, as they look like they’re lined up to throw three straight lefties at the Red Sox.