Photo by Charles Krupa / AP Photos
In Friday night’s game against the Minnesota Twins, first baseman Triston Casas went down with a season-ending injury after trying to beat out an infield base hit.
Casas, who is 6’5” and 250 pounds, was running as hard as he could before landing with his left leg awkwardly, rupturing his patellar tendon.
Casas is now immediately ruled out for the rest of the year, and seemingly won’t be able to even play in rehab games until possibly next season.
By all reports, the outlook on Casas’ career from here forward isn’t looking great. Granted, a lot of the injury history we have for this particular case comes from higher contact sports like football, but regardless, this is a devastating blow for Casas.
Casas’ future with the Red Sox
Triston Casas has been a very polarizing figure since joining the major league team. His outlandish personality and tendency to overshare in interviews left many fans, including me, turned off by him personally.
However, I was always a believer in his potential as a player. He’s a smart hitter who seems wise beyond his years when it comes to baseball, and despite starting the season slow, it looked like he was finally gaining momentum.
Regardless of how you feel about Triston as a person or a player, this situation is such a depressing one to witness, and you have to feel for the guy. Triston missed a majority of the 2024 season with a rib injury, and 2025 was set to be his breakout year.
Going forward, I think this may be the last time we see Casas in a Red Sox uniform. This past off-season, it seemed like the Red Sox were open to trading Casas. This injury, combined with his bad performance to start the year, will make his trade value very low, but that same reasoning can be applied to why they should move on from him.
Considering the reasons mentioned above, as well as his past issue that fans and team staff were not a fan of, I think it’s time to move on.
As for Casas himself, the road back to the big leagues will be a long one. But I do believe he can do it if he dedicates himself to the rehab process, and could still be a viable big leaguer no matter where he ends up.
What should the team do now at first base?
Before the injury, utility player Romy Gonzalez was platooning at first with Casas. In the recent games since the injury, it has become Romy’s job.
Gonzalez has had a solid start to the year and deserves the bump in playing time, but I have a hard time being comfortable with him being the long-term solution at the position.
Let’s talk about Roman Anthony and Marcelo Mayer. These are two of the best prospects baseball has seen in the past decade, and the Red Sox are just letting them twiddle their thumbs at Triple-A.
Both players have dominated all levels of the minor leagues and can be plug-and-play options immediately, just like Kristian Campbell was.
Craig Breslow came out and said he wasn’t interested in transitioning either player to first base and potentially jeopardize their development at their primary positions.
I understand Breslow’s thinking here, but what else are you going to do with them?
Last year, the Red Sox signed centerfielder Cedanne Rafaela to an eight-year contract extension. I really don’t like this deal for several reasons. Despite having a great glove in center, Rafaela has developed into a poor major league hitter.
Not only this, but the long-term commitment to the player now forces manager Alex Cora to play Rafaela on a daily basis (to show ownership that they didn’t just waste money), and this is essentially blocking Anthony from becoming the Red Sox starting center fielder.
You can’t move him to right, because Abreu has been great at the plate this year. And forget left, because your best player, Jarren Duran, plays there.
And when it comes to shortstop Marcelo Mayer, he is essentially waiting until Trevor Story gets hurt again or plays himself out of a job.
I can not make it more abundantly clear that Mayer and Anthony have the potential to be SUPERSTAR caliber players if given an opportunity.
Is putting Roman at first base for a reason really going to hinder his defensive development? Last I checked, you can still take fly balls in practice, even if you’re learning how to hold a runner on at first.
Mayer already plays in the infield, would the transition really be that bad?
The other factor at play here is Rafael Devers.
Devers has become the full-time DH. However, he has played games at first before, and moving to first base could open up the DH slot for Mayer or Anthony to finally get a crack at major league pitching.
Before you even say anything, no I don’t want Masataka Yoshida filling the DH role. Absolutely not.
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