Curtis Mead nearly chose a much more popular Aussie sport. But he didn't love to run

If Curtis Mead had listened to his father, he wouldn't have made his Red Sox debut on Monday night. He'd be a star in the Australian Football League.

That's not because his father is some anti-baseball zealot, though. He was a ballplayer himself, suiting up for the Adelaide Giants in the first version of the Australian Baseball League in the 1980s and '90s. Rather, it's because he knew exactly how difficult it is to make a living playing the sport in his home country -- something he wanted to save Curtis from.

“I obviously started playing baseball because of him, but I think he was honestly, probably trying to push me more toward the AFL, just because in his mind, the AFL was more attainable than going to America and playing in the Major Leagues," Mead told MLB.com this March at the World Baseball Classic. "And obviously, playing in the ABL is an awesome accomplishment, but it doesn't pay the bills like the AFL does.”

That’s one of the issues when encountering talented ballplayers in non-traditional baseball countries: How do you give a young kid hope that there’s a realistic pathway forward?

“A lot of the guys work really hard, especially when it's not their No. 1 priority,” Mead said about many of his Team Australia teammates. “They're not able to play baseball for a living, but they're working just as hard as everyone else.”

But Mead wasn’t thinking of paychecks or future MLB stretch runs back then. He just knew he loved to play.

“I didn’t enjoy running a whole lot in the AFL spring training,” Mead joked. “I thoroughly enjoyed hitting a baseball. I found it a lot easier to swing a bat for an hour than run for one.”

As a teenager, Mead focused mainly on Aussie rules football -- until he earned a spot with the Australian national baseball team when he was 16. That gave him the validation he needed to give the diamond a chance.

“I felt like I was putting more time and effort into football, so making that team -- without putting all my time and energy into baseball -- I was like, ‘Well, I enjoy it more,’” Mead recalled. “So let’s go all in and see how good I can get.”

The decision paid off. Despite being just 16 years old -- nearly a decade younger than the average ABL player -- he hit .373 with a home run in 20 games with the Adelaide Bite in the winter of 2017. With an older sister who had gone to college in America, he began thinking that might be his path, too.

At least, that was his plan before the Phillies swooped in and signed Mead as a teenager, sending him to the Gulf Coast League as a 17-year-old. A year-and-a-half later, at the end of the 2019 season, they traded him to the Rays in exchange for future ace pitcher Cristopher Sánchez. By 2023, Mead was in the Majors, becoming the 38th Aussie in the big leagues, and was making postseason history. He became the first Australian position player named to a postseason roster, then quickly also became the first Aussie to record a postseason hit and RBI.

“It’s special, it’s definitely special,” Mead said. “The 2023 postseason run, because it was so early in my career, I probably didn’t know the significance of it. Obviously, the past two seasons, I’ve been a part of teams that haven’t made the playoffs, so it’s been really special to think back on that time.”

Because he was such a highly touted prospect -- No. 33 in the game entering the 2023 season -- many thought that would be the beginning of a meteoric rise in the Majors. But baseball, as anyone who has ever tried to hit a breaking pitch can attest, is difficult. It requires an endless series of adjustments as pitchers and teams discover and attack weaknesses. Though Mead has seen Major League action in every season since his debut, he was more of a role player with a glove who could move anywhere around the infield.

But after being dealt in the offseason to the Nationals, who worked with Mead on his mental approach and his stance at the plate, all of that has changed. Mead has more than tripled his career total in home runs, smashing 17 of them this season before being acquired by the Red Sox in a trade in exchange for left-hander Connelly Early. Mead's .852 OPS is higher than Bryce Harper’s or Corbin Carroll’s; his numbers are almost a perfect side-by-side match with Dodgers slugger Max Muncy.

Red Sox GM Craig Breslow noted those changes were reasons why the Red Sox went and got him.

“There were meaningful changes to his setup, where he was holding his hands, his bat path, to his stride to where he’s consistently doing more damage. He’s always had good bat-to-ball skills. He’s never really chased, and doesn’t swing and miss a ton,” said Breslow. “He has good bat speed. And then he kind of put it all together in a way we think is real and sticky. We feel like the way he’s performed over the last few months is actually the guy he is.”

Of course, those changes may have first been evident at the World Baseball Classic, where Mead hit .357 with a home run in his WBC debut. He even credited the high-stakes early-spring games as a reason why he was optimistic about the coming season.

“I feel like once I get back to camp, I'm ready to start the season because the preparation has been pretty intense,” Mead said in March. “Playing a lot of high-level games here should ultimately get me ready for the games in America.”

Mead’s goal will now be to help out Red Sox nation as the team pushes for a postseason berth following a 15-game winning streak that got them back in contention. Perhaps he'll have a chance to set a few more Australian MLB records, though he knows they might not last long. The level of play in Australia is rising, with Guardians rookie Travis Bazzana earning a spot at this year’s All-Star Game.

“I remember thinking that when Travis [Bazzana] was taken No. 1 [in the 2024 Draft], I felt like my age group had a pretty good amount of guys go to America and play some pretty good baseball,” Mead said. “He's come in and obviously one-upped all of us. Some of the guys now playing in college, playing in the SEC, playing at really high-level schools, it's exciting to watch. I think that they're helping put Australia on the map.”