Triston Casas’ Amazing Breakout Raises Two Questions About Red Sox Star

Triston Casas already answered one important question this season: He is a foundational piece around which the Boston Red Sox can build.

Casas entered Thursday’s off-day slashing .268/.369/.499 with 23 home runs and 60 RBIs in 125 games (471 plate appearances) — very good numbers for a 23-year-old rookie — and has been one of the hottest hitters in Major League Baseball for the better part of two months.

In fact, MLB.com on Tuesday labeled Casas the No. 1 “top-performing” rookie over the past 30 days, marking the second consecutive month he earned the top spot.

Since July 8, Boston’s final game before the All-Star break, Casas has a .340/.432/.667 slash line to go along with 14 homers and 33 RBIs in 48 games (185 plate appearances). He ranks second in MLB — behind only Mookie Betts — with a 190 wRC+ in the second half. The hulking first baseman trails only Corey Seager in slugging percentage during that stretch, and only Betts and Shohei Ohtani — two bonafide superstars — have a higher OPS.

Case closed, right? Pencil him in for 2024 and beyond.

That then brings us to two follow-up questions, each with long-term implications for Boston:

1. Will Casas be named American League Rookie of the Year?

2. Should the Red Sox explore a contract extension with Casas?

Even though Casas has been awesome, the odds still suggest he won’t win AL Rookie of the Year. He entered Thursday with +1000 odds, per FanDuel Sportsbook, second on the betting board behind Gunnar Henderson of the Baltimore Orioles (-900).

Henderson, who has split time between shortstop and third base, leads all AL rookies in fWAR (3.2), whereas Casas ranks 12th — the disparity, of course, stemming from their respective defensive contributions.

This is somewhat significant because MLB recently added a Prospect Promotion Incentive, which awards an additional draft pick to the Rookie of the Year’s team if that player meets certain eligibility requirements. Those requirements include ranking as a preseason Top-100 prospect (according to at least two of MLB.com, ESPN and Baseball America) and his team giving him a full year of service time. Casas checks both boxes.

That obviously would be a nice little victory for the Red Sox, whose playoff hopes are dwindling as they navigate a difficult September schedule. But Casas’ own emergence is of greater importance, because Boston still is searching for its next long-term core. And first base — a major pain point in recent years — no longer looks like an area of need.

Casas is under club control through 2028. So, the Red Sox don’t need to work out a contract extension right away. But it might behoove them to consider the possibility sooner than later, so as to offer Casas life-altering financial security in exchange for locking him in for the long haul at a reasonable rate.

“Yes, it’s something that I would entertain,” Casas recently told The Boston Globe of a contract extension.

It appears, for now, Casas is focused on raking, with the Red Sox hanging on by a thread in the race for the AL’s third wild-card spot. He’s very much part of Boston’s present and future, a reality that wasn’t totally apparent before this season but looks more obvious with each monster performance.