The Boston Red Sox have fired chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom, the club announced Thursday.
"While parting ways is not taken lightly, today signals a new direction for our club," owner John Henry said in a statement. "Our organization has significant expectations on the field and while Chaim's efforts in revitalizing our baseball infrastructure have helped set the stage for the future, we will today begin a search for new leadership. Everyone who knows Chaim has a deep appreciation and respect for the kind of person he is. His time with us will always be marked by his professionalism, integrity, and an unwavering respect for our club and its legacy."
Also included in the press release was the following:
The search for new baseball operations leadership will begin immediately. In the interim, the day-to-day operations will continue under the direction of O'Halloran, and Assistant General Managers Eddie Romero, Raquel Ferreira, and Michael Groopman.
Bloom, 40, was hired by the Red Sox as their top baseball executive in late October 2019, departing from the Rays organization. The Red Sox were a year removed from winning the World Series in a dominant, 108-win season. They never faced elimination in the playoffs, either. Bloom was tasked with replacing Dave Dombrowski, who had been fired in September 2019.
Under Bloom, the Red Sox made the ALCS in 2021 after winning 92 games in the regular season and then dispatching of the top-seeded Rays in the ALDS. They went 78-84 last season, though, and are going to miss the playoffs again this season, currently sitting 73-72.
Bloom issued a statement to The Athletic that included the following remarks:
"Great things are now in store for the Red Sox," Bloom said in a statement Friday. "And while I'm sad that I won't be watching them from the same chair, I will still be very proud.
"Red Sox fans, you are the best. Your passion fueled me daily, and added meaning to everything I've done here. You very much deserve more championships. And you will get them."
There's been a lot of roster turnover in Bloom's tenure to highly-recognizable players, such as Mookie Betts (trade), Xander Bogaerts (free agent) and J.D. Martinez (free agent). The Red Sox did sign third baseman Rafael Devers to a significant extension this past offseason, though.
The Betts trade seems likely to be Bloom's legacy with the Red Sox, fair or not. We're talking about a player who won MVP in 2018 while the team won the World Series. There are conflicting stories about whether the Red Sox had to trade Betts, whether he would have signed an extension there, etc., but the bottom line is Bloom traded one of the best players in baseball. No matter the reason, if that happens, the task for the front office person pulling the trigger is to not botch the return.
The Red Sox got back Alex Verdugo, Jeter Downs and Connor Wong for Betts, David Price and cash. Verdugo is now 27 years old and a quality everyday right fielder. Downs was grabbed off waivers by the Nationals last December. Wong has gotten regular playing time in the majors this season for the first time and is putting together a quality season at age 27. It's just that Betts was at the time the second-best player in baseball and is still in contention for that title; he's looking like he'll finish at worst second in NL MVP voting this year, though winning it is still possible.
There's no reason to litigate whether or not Betts should've been traded. Instead, Bloom's legacy here is tied to the disappointing return. Many believed at the time it was lackluster, including R.J. Anderson here at CBS Sports, who wrote that the Red Sox received an "underwhelming return."
Bloom made many transactions over the course of his time with the Red Sox, but things got off to a bad start with that kind of disheartening return for an MVP-caliber player and it's pretty tough to recover from that. As it turns out, he never did.
