Red Sox Insider Predicts Who Debuts First - Roman Anthony Or Marcelo Mayer?

The Boston Red Sox appear to be a team in need of a spark, and one way to find it would be calling up one of the team's top prospects.

Boston currently has the number-one and number-eight prospects in all of baseball, according to MLB Pipeline. Outfielder Roman Anthony has the edge in the rankings, but shortstop Marcelo Mayer has been coming on stronger in the month of May.

With both players excelling in Triple-A, the Red Sox would be well within their rights to call up either or both players in the very near future. But with an existing logjam of position players at the major league level, it's hard to say when that might happen.

What if one has to join the roster and get acclimated for a while before the other? A Red Sox insider believes Mayer may have the inside track.

On Wednesday, MLB.com reporter Ian Browne did an AMA on Reddit, and was asked which of the two top prospects he thought would make his debut in Boston first.

"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," Browne wrote. "Trevor Story’s current deep slump at the plate bears watching considering how well Mayer is swinging at Worcester."

Story has been horrific for the last 19 games, going 9-for-78 (.115 AVG) with a .154 slugging percentage. But benching him in the fourth year of a six-year, $140 million contract is a bold statement that the Red Sox might not be fully ready to make.

Regardless, Mayer and Anthony are coming, and the question is how much longer the Red Sox can afford to hold them back. Both will make an impact in the majors at some point this season, but how much of an impact could help determine whether or not the team makes a run at October.