Red Sox’ top 2 pitching prospects added to roster know exact time
FORT MYERS, Fla. — Wikelman Gonzalez and Luis Perales, the Red Sox’ top two pitching prospects, both somehow remember the exact time assistant GM Eddie Romero called them Nov. 14.
“It was 5:27 when Eddie gave me a call to tell me that I was going to be put on the 40-man roster,” Gonzalez said through translator Carlos Villoria Benítez here at JetBlue Park. “It was a great moment for me.”
Boston selected Gonzalez and Perales to the 40-man roster Nov. 14 to protect them from being available to other clubs in December’s Rule 5 Draft.
“4:47 in the afternoon,” Perales said through translator Daveson Pérez. “I had gone to sleep, took a nap at 3. And the call came in at 4:47.”
Gonzalez was at his apartment in Venezuela waiting for the start of a Zoom meeting with the pitching coordinators. Venezuela is an hour ahead of the eastern time zone. Perales was here in Fort Myers for a mini camp so Romero made the calls within a 20-minute span.
“I was dead asleep,” Perales said. “And when they called me, it was an exciting feeling to hear them say, ‘You’re a part of the 40-man roster.’”
Romero’s call didn’t go to voicemail. Perales heard the ring.
“I’m a light sleeper,” Perales said. “But they told me the day before, ‘Hey, you’re gonna get some good news tomorrow.’ So that kind of got me waiting to hear.”
Perales’ mother, his biggest fan, is the first person he called.
“When I told her the news, she just started crying,” Perales said. “She didn’t even say anything. She just kept crying and crying. She’s someone who’s obviously really, really close to me. It was nice to give her that news. … She bet on me when I was just a little kid with a dream.”
Gonzalez’s parents were at his apartment when the righty learned the news. Gonzalez was in another room waiting for his Zoom call to start.
“I went right outside to talk to them,” Gonzalez said, adding his dad introduced him to baseball when he was 3 years old.
“And since, he’s been very strict with me,” Gonzalez added. “Sometimes I would cry (as a kid) because I didn’t want to play. But I would just come back to him and say, ‘Hey, I want to keep playing.’ So my dad is one of my biggest supporters and inspirations.”
