Reddit AMA: Will Mayer or Anthony make it to the Majors first?

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On Wednesday, MLB.com Red Sox beat reporter Ian Browne held an Ask Me Anything on Reddit with Red Sox fans at r/redsox. This mailbag features questions and answers from there.

The full AMA can be read here.

Questions and responses have been lightly edited for clarity.

Who do you see as more likely to be called up first: Marcelo Mayer or Roman Anthony?
Right now, I’d say Mayer. The Red Sox are deep in the outfield already so I’m not seeing an immediate path for Anthony. Mayer is also a year older. Trevor Story’s current deep slump at the plate bears watching considering how well Mayer is swinging at Worcester.

Going into the season I think a lot of people pegged Wilyer Abreu as the odd man out to make room for Anthony. With Abreu being a stud, Ceddanne Rafaela being sneaky good, and Jarren Duran underperforming compared to last year, who do you think takes a backseat for The Roman Empire (Roman Anthony)?
Really tough to say at this point. Honestly, it’s a challenging spot for chief baseball officer Craig Breslow to be in, though it’s a problem many teams would like to have. Things have a way of working themselves out. Here are scenarios: Someone will get injured to open a spot; A player will slump mightily to force a move. Or Breslow will have to make a trade to clear a spot.

Expectations were high for the Red Sox after a productive offseason and with major prospects coming up. What’s your assessment of that? Has the team underperformed or is their season thus far what’s to be expected?
I certainly expected this team to make the playoffs and perhaps win the division, and they still can given that nobody is running away from the field. But I agree they’ve underperformed so far. There have been inconsistencies in pretty much every facet of the game. Alex Bregman, Abreu and Aroldis Chapman have been rocks for the club so far. Almost everyone else has had variance to their performance, though Rafael Devers is certainly coming on strong of late.

The Red Sox have had an easy strength of schedule so far, compared to other clubs. However, the team has also had very few off-days. I’m wondering if the Red Sox feel they’ve had an easy schedule or a difficult schedule thus far in the season. Are they looking forward to the off-days, or are they not looking forward to playing more difficult teams?
There have definitely been some missed opportunities, particularly going 4-3 against the White Sox and 2-5 against Toronto. But I know the jam-up of games early in the season was a concern, as it was something manager Alex Cora mentioned frequently in Spring Training. I think Cora will have an easier time managing workloads once more frequent team off-days come into play.

I’m curious about Boston’s limited success with scouting, drafting, and developing starting pitching over the years. Jon Lester is really the only elite arm I can think of who's been successful after coming up through the entire process. Is it just a bad luck thing, or do you think the Sox just don't have the right people/process in place to identify and develop top of the rotation pitching talent?
The Red Sox have prioritized elite position-player talent over pitchers early in recent Drafts, though I feel like that trend is going to change under Breslow, who has overseen just one Draft so far. Also, the Sox have made some improvements at developing starters, even if they aren’t Cy Young Award types. Brayan Bello, Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford and Hunter Dobbins are all pitchers the club has developed in recent years. With the new pitching infrastructure Breslow put into place last year, I wouldn’t be surprised if we start to see more quality pitchers come through the pipeline.

This team is better than a .500 team. What's holding them back? Are they going to go on a run?
Consistency is holding them back. They need more of it in every area of the game. I think this team will get hot if Duran can go on a prolonged streak, which he really hasn’t done this season. Duran changes the dynamic of the team when he’s in a groove at the plate.