Wrapping up a busy afternoon from Fenway Park, where Chaim Bloom completed a whirlwind 10 days that started with the Red Sox seeking permission to interview him and ended with Monday's introduction of the team's new chief baseball officer. . .
* Red Sox ownership sought input from Theo Epstein of the Cubs and Andrew Friedman of the Dodgers, among others, when contemplating whether to put Bloom in charge of their baseball operations.
The responses were unanimous: he's your man.
Friedman hired Bloom in Tampa in 2005 and promoted him to Director of Player Development three years later. They worked together until Friedman left to run the Dodgers in 2014. Epstein needs no introduction in these parts, and he also spoke glowingly of his fellow Yale grad.
"Andrew Friedman thought he was one of the very great talents in baseball," said Red Sox chairman Tom Werner. "Theo Epstein thought the same thing. He's thoughtful. He's innovative. He's hungry to win. He is everything that we would hope he can be."
* A portion of Bloom's interview was devoted to breaking down his deal-making thought processes and two deals stuck out in particular: the free-agent acquisition of right-hander Charlie Morton last December. and the three-way trade that netted reliever Emilio Pagan the very same day.
Boston Red Sox
The 35-year-old Morton didn't seem like an obvious small-market strike, but the Rays landed him for two years and $30 million on Dec. 21, fresh off a 15-win season and his first All-Star berth with the Astros. It was the largest contract they had ever given a pitcher.
Morton followed up with another outstanding campaign, going 16-6 with a 3.05 ERA while reaching career-highs in innings (194.2), strikeouts (240), and strikeouts per nine (11.1). Not bad for someone with elbow and hip surgeries on his resume. The Rays looked past his age and saw a pitcher with a unique weapon -- a sweeping curveball -- that could be a separator. Combined with an elevated 94 mph fastball, Morton quickly became Tampa's ace.
The other deal that impressed the Red Sox was a complicated three-team trade with the A's and Rangers that netted Tampa a competitive balance pick, as well as Oakland's Pagan.
The well-traveled Pagan was going on his third organization in three years, following a 2017 debut with the Mariners and solid, albeit unspectacular 2018 in Oakland. He appealed to Tampa in part because he had shown an ability to pitch multiple innings, an obvious plus for a franchise employing the opener strategy.
A slight dip in strikeout rate and a similar rise in walk rate had depressed his market, but he bounced back in 2019 with a career year, going 4-2 with a 2.31 ERA and striking out 96 in 70 innings. He was acquired for a well-regarded prospect -- left-hander Brock Burke -- who was nonetheless expendable because of a 40-man roster crunch.
"We studied decisions that they made and we were impressed," Werner said. "The total decision-making was impressive. They went out in the free-agent market and got Charlie Morton. They made a great three-way trade for Pagan. You can just go up and down that roster and say they found talent in very creative ways."
* Owner John Henry made a pair of eyebrow-raising statements. The first was that the Red Sox recognized Bloom's strengths as a collaborator, which they deemed necessary following the stewardship of Dave Dombrowski, who ran a more traditional top-down structure.
"I wouldn't contrast the two. I'd just say that we were extremely desirous of bringing in someone who would augment and add as opposed to just bringing in someone who might've just been an autocrat for instance, kind of a one-man show," Henry said.
Henry later addressed the future of Mookie Betts and how it was broached during Bloom's interview.
"It was more of a general discussion," Henry said. "We talked about Mookie, J.D., other issues, but we didn't focus on, oh, what should we do? Because you're going to be looking at a number of factors, including where Mookie wants to play for the long term."
Maybe it's just me, but the line about where Mookie wants to play long-term caught my eye. Is Henry suggesting the team believes Betts would rather play somewhere else? It's possible.
* New general manager Brian O'Halloran has been with the Red Sox since 2002, when he started as an unpaid intern before becoming Epstein's assistant. The Weymouth native and Colby grad has since earned universal respect across the game for a steady demeanor and selfless attitude tailor-made for Bloom's collaborative approach. He's also fluent in Russian, should that ever come up . . .
* Bloom was asked about writing out the lineup card (he won't) or about having a stats guy on the bench in Tampa (he didn't). But to manager Alex Cora, those kinds of questions sell the Red Sox short from an analytics perspective, and he cites one of the key hits of the 2018 postseason, a pinch homer from Eduardo Nunez in Game 1 of the World Series, as proof.
"I do feel that as far as like what we do on the field, people think we were old school, but I think we were very balanced," Cora said. "We saw it. We made decisions last year based on information. You go back to Game 1 of the World Series, the information I got from Zack (Scott) and the information department — start (Rafael) Devers because he's a good matchup for (Clayton) Kershaw, but as soon as they bring in one of those lefties, bring Eduardo (Nunez). You saw what happened. So, it's not magic. I'm glad I'm able to say this now: It wasn't a magic ride. It was information and collaboration, and that's what we're doing. Obviously, with Chaim here he's going to bring some good ideas and we're going to make some adjustments and we're going to keep getting better."
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