Is he the next great Red Sox player?
Who is he and where did he come from?
He’s Kristian Eron Campbell, and he comes from Chattanooga, Tennessee by way of Marietta, Georgia. The Greater Atlanta area has become one of the world’s great sources of baseball talent in recent years, and Campbell’s alma mater, George Walton Comprehensive High School, has already produced at least nine pro ballplayers, with Carter Kieboom of the Angels being the most recent alum to reach the big leagues. But the school isn’t just known for sports, having also produced Andy Dick (Newsradio fans, let me hear you!) as well as both Chris and Rich Robinson, the brothers who formed the Black Crowes. The Black Crowes are playing Boston Calling in late May this year. Maybe Campbell will get on stage for a guitar solo.
Unlike the last great Red Sox player from Tennessee, Campbell doesn’t come from an extended family with MLB links. But his father did play college football at Tennessee, and a seven-year-old Kristian was befriended by Dee Strange-Gordon, who was impressed with the former’s dirty little league uniform when they bumped into each other at a Walmart.
What position does he play?
Campbell was primarily a second baseman during his sole season at Georgia Tech, but last year he split his time relatively evenly between second, short, and centerfield. He’s not considered to be a defensive wiz anywhere on the diamond (though he’s spent so little time in pro ball that it’s hard to draw conclusions like that at this point; more on that below), but he is one of those ballplayers who is considered athletic enough to succeed all around the diamond.
With second base having been a glaring hole in the Red Sox lineup for a number of years now and a log jam in the outfield and on the left side of the infield, there was an opportunity for Campbell to come in at take the second base job this spring. He actually didn’t have a particularly great spring by any stretch, but the job is his regardless.
Is he any good?
We’ll find out! At this point last year, absolutely nobody expected Kristian Campbell to be on the Red Sox roster today. So how did he go from being a relatively unheralded fourth-round pick in 2023 to starting for the Red Sox in 2025?
He had one of the greatest minor league seasons in recent baseball history.
Scouts always thought Campbell had good bat-to-ball skills, but no one saw his power developing much (he’d hit just four homers in his lone collegiate season, and just one homer during his first taste of pro ball in 2023). But prior the 2024 season, the Red Sox hitting development team reworked his mechanics, with the aim of both increasing his bat speed and getting him to put the ball in the air more. Needless to say, it worked.
Campbell jumped up three different levels in 2024, starting the year enjoying the underrated mustard-based barbecue of Greenville, South Carolina in high-A and ending it with whatever specialty foodstuff Worcester is known for in AAA. Across all three levels Campbell slashed .330/.439/.558 with 20 homers and 24 stolen bases. His 19.9% strikeout rate and .228 Isolated Power both topped that of Roman Anthony, who began the year with a much better offensive reputation, while Campbell and Anthony walked at roughly the same rate.
At the end of 2024, Campbell was named the minor league player of the year by Baseball America, USA Today, and The Athletic. And despite finding himself on zero top-100 prospect boards 365 days ago, he now finds himself in the top-5 of most of them. It’s been quite the surge.
There are still some concerns about his swing. It has lots of moving parts and can look loopy at times, leading some evaluators to caution that he could be exposed at the Major League level. But, that said, it’s pretty rare for a prospect to bust after putting up as strong of a season as Campbell did last year. For reference, here are the last ten guys to be named the Baseball America Minor League Player of the Year:
Sure, a Gavin Lux-esque career track would be disappointing, but there is a lot of talent on that list. Get excited, Sox fans.
Show me a cool highlight.
Nothing’s cooler than a home run. Here’s (almost) every single one he hit last year.
What’s he doing in his picture up there?
Threatening poor baseball bloggers who keep typing “Christian” by mistake.
What’s his role on the 2025 Red Sox?
He is going to start the season at the team’s starting second baseman and he’s going to stay there for quite some time. And that will be the case even if he struggles for an extended stretch, which may be more likely than not.
Campbell is on the Opening Day roster because Craig Breslow and Alex Cora think he’s ready to be a fixture in the everyday lineup for years to come. This means they’re going to give him plenty of time to adjust. If he does struggle out of the gate, fans should remind themselves of Jackson Chourio, who hit just .210/.254/.327 during the first 50 games of his career with the Brewers last year, only to finish the season with 21 homers, an OPS+ of 117, and some down-ballot MVP votes. Here’s hoping Campbell can do the same.