WORCESTER — Though he remains in the minor leagues for now, Jarren Duran’s time has nearly come.

With starting center fielder Adam Duvall out for the foreseeable future with a broken wrist, the Red Sox need outfield help and the former top prospect stands as the obvious next man up.

Though Duran was not called up immediately after the injury, that was likely a product of the gauntlet of lefties the Red Sox are facing. Once the club is through this upcoming stretch and starts facing righties again, the left-handed hitting Duran is well positioned to earn his third opportunity to establish himself as a big league regular.

The idea has to be tantalizing, but for now Duran is doing his best to stay in the moment.

“I’m trying not to think about it, when it happens, it happens, I’m just trying to focus on where I’m at right now,” Duran said. “I don’t want to get caught up in the what-ifs, so I’m just going to try and have fun where I’m at, wherever I’m at.”

Fun is the operative word. Baseball is a game and at the end of the day it’s supposed to be fun, but the first two years of Duran’s big league career were often anything but. The 26-year-old outfielder struggled publicly both on the field and emotionally during his first two call-ups in 2021 and 2022, stints that ultimately ended with demotions back to Worcester.

Now, he looks like a whole new man.

Duran reported to camp in great shape and posted impressive numbers through the spring, batting .333 with a 1.122 OPS in nine Grapefruit League games. He also took part in the World Baseball Classic, serving as a reserve outfielder on a Mexico team that won its group and made an exciting run to the semifinals.

“It was probably the most fun I’ve ever had playing baseball,” Duran said. “They basically told me to act like a kid for two weeks and I was like ‘oh I can do that no problem.'”

Though Duran played sparingly, getting just five at bats in Mexico’s six games, he said it was liberating getting to let loose and “be as loud and annoying as I want all the time.” He was also exposed to some of the most intense game-atmospheres you’ll encounter anywhere outside of the World Series, and Brian Abraham, the Red Sox Director of Player Development, said those experiences should ultimately prove more valuable than a couple of missed spring at bats.

“For him to be able to experience that with Mexico and to do what they did for them to get some of the wins that they had in the games that they had, I think it will end up being a positive in the long run,” Abraham said. “The time he’ll have here, the chance he’ll be able to play here, he’ll be able to make up for that soon.”

In order to get more regular playing time, and also due to fellow outfielder Raimel Tapia’s dominant spring performance, Duran was assigned back to Triple-A to start 2023. He was a little slow out of the gate, and Worcester getting rained out three days in a row in Buffalo last week didn’t help, but Saturday he finally broke out by going 3 for 5 with a home run.

Worcester Red Sox manager Chad Tracy said that when Duran is right he’s hitting low line drives all over the field, especially the opposite way into the gap, and lately they’ve been seeing a lot more of that out of him.

“That’s what I think I saw when he had that good day in Buffalo, everything was low, smoked, middle of the field,” Tracy said, adding that Duran has looked good defensively and seen time at left field as well. “It’s like, ok, we’re on track here.”

Nobody doubts Duran is capable of being an electrifying player at the major league level, the trouble is what happens when things inevitably go wrong. Duran has publicly acknowledged that he can be very hard on himself, and last year when he faced adversity he became far more withdrawn, a quiet and cagey presence trying desperately to keep his head above water.

Now? He’s back to being a ball of energy, a “loud and annoying” clubhouse dynamo who plays the game with childlike enthusiasm.

“I’m good right now,” Duran said. “I’m keeping my mental state in a good place, I’m doing good.”

The Red Sox have to hope that when they eventually make the call, that version of Duran walks back through the Fenway Park clubhouse door.