MLB Insider: How the Boston Red Sox will replace Adam Duvall

Adam Duvall broke his wrist, and leaves the Boston Red Sox outfield in a bad position. Here’s how the team will replace him.

Through the first week of the regular season, Adam Duvall was perhaps baseball’s best hitter. In eight games, he slashed .455/.514/1.030 with a 1.544 OPS, four home runs and 14 RBI, and was finally healthy after undergoing season-ending wrist surgery last season.

Duvall, 34, looked like a steal on a one-year, $7 million contract. But Duvall exited Sunday’s game after making a diving catch in the outfield — and MRIs revealed that he suffered a distal radius fracture in his left wrist. It is unknown just how long Duvall will be out, but he’s expected to miss at least a few weeks.

It’s a crushing blow for the Red Sox, and also for Duvall. He was in the midst of a monster start to the season and looked primed to use the one-year contract as a platform to land a multi-year contract next offseason. Now, while he gets healthy, the Red Sox are tasked with replacing Duvall. And that won’t be easy.

Red Sox: How Boston will replace Adam Duvall after injury

It’s likely the Red Sox will stick internally to replace Duvall, with Raimel Tapia and Rob Refsnyder being the most obvious candidates.

If the Red Sox do go with that platoon, Tapia figures to get the majority of the at-bats being a left-handed hitter. If the Red Sox want to get creative, they could shift infielder Enrique Hernandez back to the outfield.

The Red Sox will surely prefer testing out Tapia and Refsnyder before even thinking about shaking up their infield. But missing Duvall for a few weeks will be a huge blow to an offense that ranked third in baseball with 59 runs scored.