Red Sox recall, will start top prospect Anthony

The Boston Red Sox have called up outfielder Roman Anthony, the No. 1 prospect in baseball, hopeful he can provide a jolt to a team that has disappointed over the season's first 67 games, the club announced Monday.

Anthony will start in right field and bat fifth in Monday's game against the Tampa Bay Rays.

Anthony, 21, will arrive in the big leagues with polish rare for a player his age. A second-round draft pick in 2022, he blitzed through the minor leagues, reaching Double-A in his first full season in 2023, dominating between Double-A and Triple-A in 2024 and crushing Triple-A pitching with his sweet left-handed swing this season.

Calls for his promotion were resounding among Red Sox fans, whose frustration with a 32-35 start left them looking to Anthony as a potential solution to their ills.

Boston was loath to summon Anthony, with chief baseball officer Craig Breslow suggesting he needed more experience in left field and fewer balls hit on the ground. His arrival comes on the heels of a 497-foot grand slam -- the longest ball hit at any level of organized baseball this season -- for Triple-A Worcester over the weekend.

Anthony hit .288/.423/.491 at Triple-A with 10 home runs and 29 RBIs in 265 plate appearances. Known as much for his discerning eye as his immense power, the 6-foot-3, 200-pound Anthony walked 51 times and struck out 56 for Worcester.

Where he will play with the Red Sox is a question that has vexed team officials -- and contributed to him not already having joined infielders Kristian Campbell and Marcelo Mayer, with whom Anthony comprised the so-called big three, in the major leagues. Boston has All-Star Jarren Duran in left field, Gold Glove candidate Ceddanne Rafaela in center field and Wilyer Abreu, whose bat has thrived this season, in right field.

In a corresponding move, the Red Sox placed Abreu on the 10-day injured list with a left oblique strain.

Boston nonetheless deemed now the right time to call up Anthony. Because his promotion was delayed until now, Anthony will not be eligible for free agency until after the 2031 season -- unless he wins American League Rookie of the Year, which would come with a full year of service time and push his clock up to the 2030 season. Absent the award, Anthony also could miss being a Super Two, a category designated for the players in each class with the most service time. Avoiding Super Two status, which gives players a fourth year of negotiating their salary via arbitration, could save Boston upwards of $10 million.

Multiple officials and players in the Red Sox organization were clamoring for Anthony to head to Fenway Park well before Monday. His leap from Low-A to High-A to Double-A in 2023 placed him among the prospect elite throughout baseball, and Anthony has done nothing to disqualify himself from that since.

He more than held his own at the top two levels of the minor leagues last year as a 20-year-old, finishing with a .291/.396/.498 line with 18 home runs and 21 stolen bases. Particularly impressive was his strike-zone discipline. Anthony's rate of swinging at pitches outside of the strike zone at Triple-A this year would rank among the best in the major leagues.

Boston could find room for him in the lineup by moving Rafaela to second base -- where he has played regularly -- and sliding Campbell over to first base. Boston lost its first baseman, Triston Casas, to a season-ending knee injury and also is playing without arguably its best player, third baseman Alex Bregman, who is out with a strained quadriceps.

A number of Red Sox players, from Bregman to new ace Garrett Crochet to catcher Carlos Narvaez, have exceeded expectations this season -- and Boston has still struggled. The Red Sox lead MLB in errors and have a 6-17 record in one-run games. Only Atlanta has more one-run losses, with 19, and only the Chicago White Sox, at 4-16, have a worse one-run record.