WORCESTER — The reason Chad Tracy wasn’t worried about Roman Anthony’s mini-slump early last week is the same reason he thinks Anthony is especially well-equipped to handle any initial challenges he’s likely to encounter in his early days in the majors, whenever he’s called up.
When Anthony will finally get called up to the Red Sox has gone from a topic for local speculation to one being discussed nationally around baseball.
Anthony, of course, came into the 2025 season as the No. 1-ranked prospect in all of professional baseball. The 21-year-old outfielder from Florida has spent the first 62 games of the season backing up that distinction by dominating in Triple A.
Every day that Anthony thrives for the Worcester Red Sox, while the Boston Red Sox struggle, increases the volume and intensity of voices urging the club to summon him to the majors.
Those calls reached a new decibel level on Saturday, after his 10th home run of the season left his bat at 115 miles per hour and traveled 497 feet.
The Red Sox have wanted to be deliberate. They don’t want to skip developmental steps for a player this young.
But now, each day the Red Sox wait increases the anticipation and the expectations Anthony will face when he eventually arrives. Not everyone thrives when thrust into that spotlight, especially in Boston.
Tracy has seen lots of players as a former major league player and now as the manager of the WooSox. He said Anthony’s mixture of talent and approach created a unique likelihood for success.
“I thoroughly enjoy sitting in that chair and watching him play baseball. Watching him navigate all the extra extracurricular that is around him is equally as enjoyable because there’s so much surrounding him,” Tracy said Thursday. “He just handles everything with such grace and maturity. It’s fairly impressive to watch a guy at his age be able to do that.
“Some guys ride the roller coaster and other guys stay right here,” Tracy continued, gesturing a calm, straight line. “And 99.9% of the time Roman’s right here. …He’s as equipped for it psychologically as anybody I’ve ever been around, and at his age, that is not common.”
Anthony has a ready-made support system if he needs the help. In addition to friendships with Red Sox rookies Marcelo Mayer and Kristian Campbell, Anthony is close with Baltimore’s Jackson Holliday, who was the No. 1 prospect going into last season. In fact, Anthony spent part of the offseason living in Oklahoma with Holliday to help get ready for this season.
“It’s been great. We talk a lot,” Anthony said. “But it’s nothing really. We play enough baseball. When we talk, we don’t focus on baseball unless it’s in the offseason.
“Obviously he’s been in the big leagues for a while now,” Anthony continued. “But I don’t text him and ask him how to handle it or anything like that. We just talk.”
Anthony has done well trusting his instincts. He is aware that every at-bat he has is being scrutinized, but he’s blocking out the attention.
“You don’t have a choice, so you learn to just deal with it over time. That comes with having success,” he said. “I think any of it is a learning lesson. No matter what kind of attention you get, you can always learn from it and just being able to kind of manage that and stay in the middle. That’s all it can ever be. When you start thinking about other things, you get in trouble.”
He stayed in the middle as he dealt with going 4-for-30 over seven games and he stayed there even after his attention-grabbing home run blast on Saturday. He’ll let other people worry about how each success or failure impacts the timetable of getting called up.
“I’m here. I’m working to get better here every day. said Anthony, who said the scrutiny hasn’t taken anything away from the experience. “I get to play baseball for a living, so it’s fun regardless of where I am.”
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