The stud Red Sox prospect who's flying under the radar

This story was excerpted from Ian Browne’s Red Sox Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Talk about the burgeoning farm system of the Red Sox, and three names (Roman Anthony, Kristian Campbell and Marcelo Mayer) immediately get mentioned. While that is warranted, considering Anthony (MLB’s No. 2 prospect), Campbell (No. 7) and Mayer (No. 12) are ranked as three of the top 12 prospects in the game, it is allowing other promising Minor Leaguers to fall under the radar.

On Wednesday morning at the Fenway South complex, Red Sox manager Alex Cora was asked to name someone who falls under that category.

“Mikey Romero [for] the last three, four days,” said Cora. “He’s a good player, a really good player.”

In fact, Romero was considered good enough at one point to be Boston’s first-round Draft selection (24th overall pick out of Orange Lutheran High School in California) in 2022.

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So why isn’t Romero (Boston's No. 11 prospect) mentioned these days in the same breath as Mayer (a player he was close to as a travel ball teammate in high school), Anthony (taken one round after Romero in the same year) and Campbell (drafted the year after Romero)?

An injury. A significant one. Just prior to what was supposed to be his first full professional season in 2023, Romero injured his back before he even got to Spring Training.

“It happened a little bit before [Spring Training],” said Romero, a middle infielder who has played shortstop most of his life. “At first it wasn’t a stress fracture. It turned into one, and just, obviously, missed basically the whole year in ‘23. [I] came back in ‘24 and played pretty well, and here I am now feeling healthy and strong.”

Red Sox evaluators are impressed with the way Romero, 21, has not only put his back issue in the past, but has added muscle to his body.

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“I had a stress fracture and just had to spend time rehabbing it and took care of it, and I’m good now, thankfully,” Romero said. "So it's just about having a good routine and staying on top of it, that's all it is, and making sure that I'm strong in my core and my back and my glutes, and I stay flexible."

Beyond the body are things that are more instinctual than physical. And Cora picked up on those things just watching Romero as a Minor League extra who came over to big league camp for some recent Grapefruit League games.

“Just the baseball player [he is],” said Cora. “Good at-bats, good defender. Mikey Romero is a good player. We’ve just got to [keep] him healthy. He did everything this offseason to put himself in good shape. He’s a lot stronger now. This is the first time I’ve had a look at him consistently, and I like him as a player.”

Romero continued his recent run in Thursday afternoon’s 7-4 Grapefruit League loss to the Blue Jays at TD Ballpark, going 2-for-3 with a home run and a double. After scorching a 102.8 mph double off the wall in right-center field off veteran righty Chris Bassitt in the second inning, Romero crushed a Statcast-projected 412-foot homer with a 103.9 mph exit velocity off reliever Nick Sandlin in the fourth.

"He just controlled the strike zone -- both at-bats,” Cora said. “Game-planned with the coaches, and then he went out and executed. He's a good player, like I said a few days ago. Some really good at-bats today."

At this time last year, Romero was still strengthening his back. He started his season in May with a rehab assignment in the Rookie-level Florida Complex League. A week later, he was placed at High-A Greenville. And on Aug. 27, he moved up to Double-A Portland.

For the season, the middle infielder played in 78 games and got 336 at-bats. Romero showed what the Red Sox saw in him before the injury, belting 24 doubles and 16 homers while finishing the season with an .821 OPS.

The plan is for Romero to spend more time at Double-A to start this season, with an eventual callup to Triple-A Worcester likely at some point in the next few months.

“Two steps [from the Majors] is not that far,” said Romero. “There's a lot of guys that get called up from Double-A. I'm not necessarily saying that's what is going to happen for me, but you're super close. You're really close. That's how I feel. I feel like I'm close, and I'm excited to keep my head down and work this year.”

It isn’t lost on Romero that he’s lost some ground on some of the prospects he came up with.

“Roman, he got drafted the same class as me. He’s obviously a stud. I’m super excited for him, because he deserves everything that he's accomplished so far, and it looks like he’s going to make an impact at the big league level, hopefully this year,” said Romero.

“Marcelo, it’s pretty cool because I’ve known him since we were in high school together. Just to see that he’s knocking on the door already, I’m excited to see what he can do this year. He’s obviously one of the top prospects in the game.”

As for Romero?

“I’m just trying to play my game, and hopefully, it takes me to Boston,” said Romero.

And players in Boston can’t fall under the radar even if they try.