Red Sox
“As you go up there are more expectations, more cameras, as we can see now.”
Kyle Teel, Marcelo Mayer and Roman Anthony arrived at Polar Park on Tuesday. (Danielle Parhizkaran/Globe staff writer)
WORCESTER – Roman Anthony, Marcelo Mayer and Kyle Teel have heard it all at this point in the summer.
There are high expectations on the shoulders of three young prospects who have never played in the major leagues, and the pressure that comes with talking about getting the Red Sox back on track after being stuck in the basement of the AL East for much of the last five years is intense.
Most importantly, the trio has rarely looked through a scouting profile, listened to a podcast or seen a front-page article that didn’t mention all three as hopefuls for a Red Sox team lacking homegrown stars.
Mayer, Anthony and Teel are all their own masters.
Teel, a laid-back catcher with promising hitting skills, is the elder statesman at 22, although he has only been in Boston’s organization for 13 months. Anthony, who just turned 20 in May, has developed a talent for using his keen eye to extend batting times and to knock down any pitch that lands right in his area of responsibility.
And the 21-year-old Mayer has long been considered Boston’s most promising blue-chip player – selected fourth in the 2021 MLB Draft, he is considered the franchise’s shortstop who can impact the game both at bat and on the field.
But whether it’s pure luck or a higher power, all three of the Red Sox’s most promising talents have followed the same development plan this summer – first at Double-A Portland and now with Triple-A Worcester.
“It’s a dream come true,” Teel said Tuesday before his Triple-A debut at Polar Park. “I’m so grateful. It shows that hard work pays off. And the most important thing is to keep moving forward, work hard every day and be around these guys every day.”
“It’s great. On the field we have fun playing together and competing against each other. And off the field we hang out together and are good friends too.”
Make no mistake: The Red Sox’s decision to promote all three, Mayer, Anthony and Teel, at the same time was anything but a coincidence.
One could argue that the trio should have been called up to Triple-A even earlier.
Mayer — who was named the second-best prospect in baseball last month by The Athletic’s Keith Law — posted a .307/.370/.480 batting average with eight home runs, 36 extra-base hits and 13 steals in 77 games with Portland, while Teel (MLB Pipeline’s 27th-ranked prospect) posted a .298 batting average with 11 home runs and 31 extra-base hits in 84 games in his first full professional season.
Even Anthony, who was still facing high school pitchers just two years ago, finished his season against Double-A pitchers with 15 home runs, 38 extra-base hits and 16 steals in 84 games.
Admittedly, WooSox manager Chad Tracy doesn’t expect a smooth transition for any player moving from Double-A to Triple-A.
“It’s big. I think the experience here – the strike zone changes… it gets smaller. But the quality of the material, the experience on the mound, all those things change,” Tracy said of the increased competition in Worcester. “You’re playing against guys who have big-league experience – who know what they can do. I told all three guys, this is the end of school now, right?”
“Like you’re talented. You go through A-ball and Double-A and your talent carries you. This is where you have to start thinking along with the pitcher because they’re going to be able to do things they can’t do in Double-A – all those little things. And then the jump from here to the big leagues is just as big, if not bigger.”
Tuesday was a strong start for Anthony, who hit 3 of 4 and had a double in Worcester’s 4-3 win over the Lehigh Valley IronPigs on Tuesday. Teel — batting fifth in the lineup — hit 0 of 4 with two strikeouts while Mayer did not play due to a lingering lower back injury.
Even though the Red Sox are taking a conservative approach to getting Mayer back on the field, the setback caused by his injury will not prevent the young shortstop from joining his close friends in this latest call-up.
Aside from the fact that all three players have developed a close bond with one another in Portland, keeping this group at the next level also allows the trio to prepare together for the inevitable challenges that lie ahead against Triple-A competition.
“Obviously it’s the dream to get here and this is another step on the path,” Anthony said. “But it was nice to get called up and obviously having three of us makes everything even better. And I think it makes the adjustment a little bit easier when you have two other guys that you’re with every day that are going through the same thing.”
It is a unique fraternity that Mayer, Anthony and Teel joined last year.
The Red Sox have seen many MLB stars emerge from their farm system over the years. But it’s rare that a trio of talent has come through a team’s pipeline at the same time — or that they’re seemingly inseparable when it comes to scouting projections.
The pressure will continue to mount for all three players, especially since Fenway Park is only 45 miles from Polar Park.
But for Boston’s Big 3, all that talk means something is clearly working. And whatever challenges come their way, they plan to tackle them together.
“I was always taught to play to win,” Mayer said. “It takes all the pressure off me. … I always make this joke these days – there’s Perfect Game, all these ranking websites. So I’ve been in rankings since I was five. So you grow up with that pressure. So it’s nothing new.”
“I think the three of us just have fun,” Anthony added. “We just like to have fun. It’s the same game we’ve been playing since we were five years old, so nothing really changes. Obviously as we move up there’s more expectations and more cameras, as we can see now, but nothing changes. We’re just going to go out there and have fun and keep playing the game the right way, and everything else will fall into place.”
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