The Royals lineup had a new face in it for the series opener against the Red Sox on Monday night, and there was also a familiar face in a new spot.

Third baseman Emmanuel Rivera was called up from Triple-A Omaha and added to the 40-man roster Monday, met the team in Boston, hit sixth in the lineup and went 2-for-4 in his Major League debut in Kansas City's 6-5 loss. To make room for Rivera on the roster, the Royals designated Kelvin Gutierrez for assignment.

The other shakeup was slotting Jorge Soler in at the No. 2 spot of the order rather than his typical middle-of-the-order presence. It’s a move the Royals hope will unlock the production that Soler has lacked all season, and the hope has strategy behind it.

Soler entered Monday night with a .601 OPS and just six home runs in 70 games. That’s far off his typical slugging presence, and the 29-year-old has been mired in the worst slump of his career since the beginning of the season. He’s hitting .179 across 229 at-bats with 80 strikeouts and 29 walks. According to Statcast, Soler is chasing 24.8 percent of the time, which isn’t the worst of his career (25.7 percent in a full 2018 season) but is magnified by his lack of power elsewhere.

Manager Mike Matheny explained that hitting Soler second isn’t to see him take the same approach in a different part of the lineup. It’s to give him chance to use a new approach entirely.

“What can we do to get this guy going?” Matheny said. “And to continue in the same route, it’s not working right now. So we had a very clear conversation with him about what this is. It’s not taking the same at-bats in a different spot in the lineup. Let’s try and truly start rethinking your at-bats. That No. 2 spot is a guy that gets things done. He’ll take a walk, he’ll move a run, he’ll grind through at-bats. We want good at-bats all the way through. As much as we have told him, ‘You’re not just sitting in there swinging to watch a moonshot happen every once in a while … in the five or six spot, I think it’s still what he was doing.

“Trying to give him a different concept of himself as a hitter, that we hope will naturally translate into some confidence. And then accidentally, he’ll bump into a couple that go a long way, but it’s not the aim to go in there and just swing as hard as you can hoping to make up for whatever in the past. And part of this is where you are in that lineup shows you what we need you to do.”

The move doesn’t come without questions, as the No. 2 spot is typically reserved for one of the club’s best hitters and Soler isn’t that right now. But the Royals want to get him back to the dangerous hitter that he’s shown to be, and this is something worth trying as the offense looks to find its footing and get everyone clicking.

Matheny said that Soler understood this new approach when the coaching staff talked to him about it, and Soler wants to get his swing right more than anybody. And in his first at-bat Monday, Soler poked a single the opposite way to put two on base for Carlos Santana, whose three-run homer put the Royals up 3-0 in the first inning. Soler was 2-for-4 Monday with two singles, showing the approach the Royals wanted to see when they decided to make this move. Now the challenge will be to maintain that.

“We need [him] to be well rounded, take your walks when you can, move guys over, be part of a catalyst to this offense and not just a guy that swings from his heels to try and make something big happen,” Matheny said. “We believe that power is going to be there by accident. Instead of just trying to force it, let’s try and put you in a spot to help our offense, do it in a different way than what you’ve been doing.”

The other spark that could come to the offense, which scored five runs in three games against the Rangers over the weekend, is Rivera. The 24-year-old hit .282/.337/.593 with 14 homers and 40 RBIs in 44 games with the Storm Chasers and ranked near the top of almost every offensive category in the Triple-A East. After a solid winter ball season, Rivera caught the eye of Matheny and the big league coaching staff in Spring Training with the preparation and work he showed. Rivero said in late March that his goal this year was to reach the big leagues.

And now here he is.

“We’re working on having the best offense we can while also just giving guys opportunities when they show that they’ve prepared and are ready,” Matheny said. “He’s having a great season there offensively and very consistent on the offensive side. Those are the times that we give them a shot.”