Roman Anthony's eventful Red Sox debut includes 111 mph rocket, RBI, error that ‘just can't happen'

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BOSTON — Many highly touted rookies have rather forgettable major league debuts in which they don't find themselves in the middle of the action. Roman Anthony's first game, however, was pretty eventful.
After being called up to the majors just a couple hours before first pitch Monday, Anthony — the consensus No. 1 prospect in baseball — saw it all in a 10-8 Red Sox loss. He ripped an 111.2 mph liner that resulted in a groundout, made a costly error as the Rays jumped ahead in the fifth, had his first career RBI despite going 0-for-4, reached base for the first time with a walk and was lifted for a pinch-hitter with the game hanging in the balance in the 11th inning.
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Anthony, hitting fifth and playing right field (a position at which he had just four starts in Triple-A this season) didn't light up the box score. But his night was an eventful one.
'It was awesome,' he said about his debut. 'Unfortunately, we couldn't get a win but it was a good experience, getting it over with, the first one out of the way.'
As Anthony came to the plate for his long-awaited first at-bat in the second inning, he got a loud ovation from the Fenway Park crowd. He then popped out to left field. Two innings later, he absolutely smoked a Shane Baz fastball up the middle, but the ball hit Baz and deflected third baseman Junior Caminero, who threw Anthony out. A sixth-inning at-bat was a strikeout. But the seventh inning brought a six-pitch walk as Anthony reached base for the first time and an RBI groundout up the middle in the ninth turned a 7-5 deficit into a one-run game. Anthony said he felt comfortable at the plate all night and his manager concurred.
'He was able to slow it down,' said Alex Cora. 'The walk, hit the ball hard, stayed up the middle, didn't try to do too much. It was a good first day.'
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Defensively, Anthony had a rather costly slip-up in a somewhat unfamiliar position on what was a wet, misty night at Fenway. One batter after Jarren Duran bobbled a ball in left and allowed Tampa Bay's second run to score in the fifth, Anthony let a Yandy Díaz single skid past him on the outfield grass, allowing Brandon Lowe to score from first and Díaz to get to third. The Rays went up, 3-0, but the Red Sox tied the game an inning later.
'Just can't happen,' Anthony said. 'It's one of those plays, I've dealt with that skip a million times in my career. It's tough when you lose a game like that and you feel like that's the reason why you lost, little things like that.'
Anthony's night came to a premature end when Cora — for the second time in the game — pinch-hit for one of Boston's top prospects with a right-handed journeyman. In the bottom of the sixth, Cora subbed in Romy Gonzalez for the left-handed Marcelo Mayer against southpaw Garrett Cleavinger and was rewarded when Gonzalez tied the game with a two-run, opposite-field double. Cora had let Anthony, another lefty, face Cleavinger but pulled him for Rob Refsnyder against rookie left-hander Ian Seymour in the 11th. Refsnyder worked a leadoff walk but Boston unable to close the gap and lost.
'They've never been pinch-hit (for) in the minors,' Cora acknowledged. 'This is what we do here. There's gonna be lefties that we're going to hit for them. They're gonna pinch-hit for other guys. We've got some good pinch-hitters here. Romy, that's his job, and Ref. We'll pick and choose. But they understand.'
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Anthony's first MLB hit will come soon, perhaps as soon as Tuesday night against Ryan Pepiot. He felt like there were some things to build on at the end of a chaotic Monday he'll never forget.
'I thought I swung at good pitches,' he said. 'Unfortunately, some of those balls couldn't skip up the middle and drive some runs in. I felt like I did a good job of putting the bat on the ball and getting guys over.'
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Read the original article on MassLive.