Masataka made his first appearance of the season in the eighth inning of Saturday’s game against the Reds. He pinch hit for catcher Carlos Narváez, drew a four-pitch walk, then was substituted by pinch runner Conner Wong.

Cora didn’t detail exactly who would sit when among Ceddanne Rafaela (off day soon), Wilyer Abreu, Jarren Duran, and Roman Anthony. But he did say the Sox are comfortable with Yoshida manning the outfield against the Astros, who have a smaller left field (albeit with a tricky left-center).

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“It’s not easy,” Cora said of the balance. “Whoever thinks that this is easy to move them around, they’re wrong. I’m going to say it like that. It’s not that easy, but I’ll make it work.

“[Those involved] know the plan, so we’ll stick to it, and I think everybody’s going to benefit from it. We see their past, right? Roman’s first full season. Jarren posts, he plays. Ceddanne in August and September, he has struggled, and Wilyer has been banged up [periodically in years past], right? He hasn’t played a full season yet, so I think this whole thing is going to help him.”

Connelly Early was not a Reds fan, per se, growing up two states away in Virginia. But he was an Aroldis Chapman fan when Chapman burst onto the major league scene with the Reds at Great American Ball Park in the early 2010s.

That makes Early’s season debut on the same mound Sunday an extra special occasion.

“It’s pretty crazy to be back here, seeing him throw the last game [Thursday]. So a good time for sure,” Early said Saturday. “It’s awesome [being in this stadium]. Obviously, the Opening Day crowd here was amazing. So hopefully that carries over [through the weekend].”

Early was a surprise selection for the season-opening rotation, a product of his strong spring training as well as the Red Sox’ desire to have Johan Oviedo available as a long reliever at least temporarily.

“My whole goal since the last game of the season was to make this roster,” he said. “I feel like mentally I’m in really good spot going into this outing. So hopefully just carry over what we did last season, carry over what I did this whole offseason, and be in a good spot on the mound.”

When preseason push came to regular-season shove, Garrett Crochet scrapped altogether his winter project, a splitter.

He toyed with it — as a fifth option or so in a deep repertoire — throughout spring training, but didn’t love how it was going. So on Opening Day against the Reds, he reverted back to the changeup he threw last season.

“I feel like too much got made of that,” Crochet said of the splitter experiment. “I was thinking about [abandoning] it for a couple of weeks. I was like, ‘[expletive] it.’”

The Red Sox re-signed infielder Brendan Rodgers to a two-year minor league contract, allowing him to rehab his surgically repaired right shoulder for at least most and perhaps all of this season, then give it another go with the organization in 2027.

Rodgers originally was in major league spring training, with an outside shot at making the team (a bench spot that ultimately went to Andruw Monasterio).

After he severely injured his shoulder late February, the Sox technically released him near the end of camp, only to bring him back on a longer commitment — allowing them to potentially reap some reward after helping a guy back to full health.

Garrett Whitlock is on baby watch, with his wife, Jordan, due to give birth any day to their second child, another son. Whitlock pointed to his “go bag” — a packed suitcase — in his locker, ready to scurry home to Alabama when the call comes. . . . Cora on Ceddanne Rafaela’s RBI single in the opener, on a pitch about three ball widths above the strike zone: “It was a ball. He chased. So the result was great, but it was a pitch up there as well. So we’re talking about chasing. He’s still chasing.”

Tim Healey can be reached at timothy.healey@globe.com. Follow him @timbhealey.