‘Clear-cut favorites to win AL pennant’: How Red Sox have surged up standings
Bob Nightengale and Steve Gardner break down the Red Sox’s surge up the standings and why Boston has emerged as the clear-cut favorite to win the AL pennant.
Joshua Báez made sure his major league debut somehow exceeded the wild expectations that preceded it.
Báez’s emotional journey to the St. Louis Cardinals’ lineup culminated Saturday, Aug. 15 when he hit a towering two-run home run on the first pitch he saw from Chicago Cubs left-hander Matthew Boyd at Wrigley Field, sending the visiting dugout into padding-pounding pandemonium and the more than two dozen family members on hand from around the USA and Dominican Republic into unabashed glee.
Báez, 21, was already sporting a wide and disbelieving grin as he rounded first base, the perfect welcome-to-the-big-leagues moment for the Cardinals’ No. 3 prospect. After all, Báez had already shown his flair for the emotional.
Báez was a third-round pick of the Cardinals in 2021, out of Dexter School in Brookline, Mass. He was midway through his second full pro season, at Class A Palm Beach, when his father, Jose Manuel, who’d had a profound impact on his baseball development, passed away.
Báez continued climbing the Cardinals’ system and the prospect charts, rising to No. 56 in Baseball America’s top 100 ratings this summer. And then came June 16, and the third anniversary of his father’s death.
The Cardinals outfield prospect marked the occasion by hitting four home runs for Class AAA Memphis, pointing to the sky after each of them.
“I was just trying to push through, and it’s just insane I was able to hit four home runs in one night,” he said then.
It was a significant step in doubling down on his 2025 power breakout, when he hit 20 homers and got on the Cardinals’ big league radar. This year, he’s crushed 34 home runs and driven in 90 runs for Memphis, all but daring the Cardinals to ignore him.
That’s proven impossible with every level Báez climbs. And now, he’s reached the highest in dramatic fashion.