The Boston Red Sox never know what Kristian Campbell will do next. He might dive to his left or spin to his right at second base to make a play that makes his teammates gasp, as he did so often this spring that he forced his way onto the major league roster. He might become the 14th player in the last 50 years to reach base safely in his first 17 career games, as he did Monday with a solo home run. Or he might say something that leaves the clubhouse reeling, as he does just about every day.
The Red Sox first learned how wide-eyed the 22-year-old Campbell was before the season started, when the team traveled to Monterrey, Mexico, for an exhibition series against the Monterrey Sultanes. As the Red Sox checked into their hotel, Campbell asked, “Who’s my roommate?” Manager Alex Cora gently explained that you get your own hotel room in the big leagues.
Campbell was similarly shocked a few days later to learn that the team has its own airplane. Once he got to Boston, he cracked them up by referring to his fellow Red Sox not as his teammates but as his friends. He introduces himself to fans, as if they are not already wearing his jersey.
Campbell is a key member of a Red Sox team that has a real chance to win the American League East for the first time in seven years. He is the new beneficiary of an eight-year, $60 million contact extension. And at the moment, he is Boston's Greenest Monster.
“Honestly, I’m happy, because he’s just where his feet are at,” says 28-year-old left fielder Jarren Duran. “He’s not looking ahead.”
Kristian Campbell DESTROYS this baseball 💥
He has now reached safely in all 17 games he has played as a Major Leaguer!
The stories now verge on the apocryphal: Teammates—friends—say he grew up idolizing Padres right fielder Fernando Tatís Jr. (age 26), that he has never heard of Baltimore Orioles righty Charlie Morton (pitching in his 18th season, five of those for Campbell’s hometown Atlanta team), that he’s pretty sure the famous basketball player who sticks his tongue out is LeBron James.
Campbell acknowledges most of it is true, although he takes issue with that last one. “I know who Michael Jordan is,” he insists. (And for the record, whether he was familiar with Morton’s oeuvre or not, Campbell worked a 3–2 count in their first meeting last week, then hit a two-run homer.)
Campbell does not mind being cast as the innocent rookie. “I’m still a senior in college,” he says. “I got drafted out of my sophomore year, so last year was my junior year. This [would be] my senior year if I was still in school. You’ve gotta put it in perspective.”
Perhaps Campbell’s greatest tool is his ability to do just that. Before his first game, in Arlington, Texas, he found himself gazing at the crowd. He might have made eye contact with each of the 37,587 fans in attendance. There’s a lot of people here, he thought. But he took a breath and reminded himself that he was playing the same game he loved as a dirt-covered Little Leaguer in Chattanooga, Tenn.; a 2023 fourth-round draft pick coming out of Georgia Tech; and last year’s Baseball America Minor League Player of the Year. By his second or third major league game, he says, he was able to limit his vision to the first deck of fans. And now, as a veteran of nearly three weeks? “I’m locked in,” he says. “Back to normal type of locked in.”
