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Chaim Bloom’s biggest critics, his sons, old enough to understand Mookie Betts trade
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- Chaim Bloom’s biggest critics, his sons, old enough to understand Mookie Betts trade
Chaim Bloom's two sons were too young to understand their dad traded Mookie Betts from the Red Sox to the Dodgers in 2020. But now that they're older, they can grasp how big a deal it was.
"My boys love baseball. Now they're old enough to really follow this very closely. They're way worse than anybody in the media in terms of how hard they are on me, and they were young enough when that happened that they weren't really aware of it," Bloom said on "Foul Territory." "And now my oldest, who just realized last year that I traded Mookie Betts, he's like, 'Dad, what are you doing?'"
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The Red Sox hired Bloom in October 2019 to succeed Dave Dombrowski. Four months later, Bloom traded Betts in his first move as chief baseball officer for a package that included Alex Verdugo , Jeter Downs and Connor Wong .
Wong is the only remaining player left from the trade still with the Red Sox.
"Sometimes there are hard decisions you have to make in the here and now," Bloom said .
Since leaving Boston , Betts has won three World Series with the Dodgers. Earlier this year, Bloom reflected on the trade .
"It's never fun to take a player of that caliber in the prime of his career — that I had seen right in my face as an opponent for so many years with the Rays , then be on the same side as him very briefly — and end up moving him," Bloom said . "Obviously, there was a bigger picture than that deal. That deal wasn't about the valuation of the talent. It was just about where the organization was."
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The Red Sox fired Bloom in September 2023 after making the postseason just one time (2021) and finished last in the American League twice (2020, 2022) during his tenure . They finished the 2023 season in last, as well. He had a hand in drafting Kristian Campbell , Marcelo Mayer and Roman Anthony — who was baseball's No. 1 prospect.
Now the president of baseball operations for the Cardinals, Bloom will take a similar, patient approach in helping to get St. Louis back to the postseason.
"The Cardinals win first and foremost with players we develop," Bloom said in September . "That operating model that has sustained this organization for decades is still sound. But for it to develop the results that we need, we have to be elite at acquiring and developing baseball talent in every aspect.
"When we have to choose between short term gratification and our bigger goal of contending consistently," he later added , "we will choose the long term."
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