Less than two months after taking over as the Cardinals’ president of baseball operations, Chaim Bloom made his first significant trade Tuesday. It just so happened it came with the team who had fired him two years ago.
Bloom’s Cardinals shipped veteran starter Sonny Gray (and $20 million in cash) to the Red Sox for pitchers Richard Fitts and Brandon Clarke in the first big offseason move for two clubs going in different directions. The Red Sox got a veteran starter with postseason experience. The Cardinals moved an older player on an expiring contract and got two promising young arms in return. For Bloom, the talks presented a new experience. He was no longer working for the Red Sox, but had to work with them.
“There were different conversations with different people in both organizations that led to this outcome,” Bloom said on a Zoom call. “It was a little strange, obviously, but at the end of the day, that doesn’t really impact things. We’re trying to do the best we can for our club no matter who it’s with. If we accomplish our objectives, then it doesn’t matter. It shouldn’t matter where I worked last or anything other than what’s best for the St. Louis Cardinals. I know they’re trying to accomplish something themselves, too.
“We each had some different objectives we were looking to accomplish and we were able to match up.”
Bloom, who served as Boston’s chief baseball officer from October 2019 to September 2023, succeeded John Mozeliak as the Cardinals’ top baseball operations boss after the season. In St. Louis, he’s being tasked with rebuilding a Cardinals team that won just 78 games in 2025. Moving Gray was the first move. He’s also expected to deal Nolan Arenado and potentially others, including Brendan Donovan or possibly Willson Contreras.
The Gray negotiations were a little complicated for Bloom and Craig Breslow, a fellow Yale product who succeeded him in the big chair in Boston. The Red Sox had been interested in Gray for a while and expressed that they’d like to be involved in talks for him at the GM Meetings in Las Vegas earlier this month. Agreeing to a player package was the first step, done in concert with the clubs figuring out how much of Gray’s massive 2026 salary each one of them would cover. The final step was a contract negotiation in which the Red Sox slightly revised Gray’s contract to guarantee $31 million in salary next year while tacking on a $10 million buyout to a mutual option for 2027 that will be declined. That stipulation raised his guaranteed earnings by $1 million, from $40 million to $41 million. He was compensated for agreeing to waive his full no-trade clause.
“You’d obviously always rather not have to put cash in a deal,” said Bloom. “But if that’s what’s possible with the other side and that nets you the best return, then it’s been great to have ownership’s backing to be able to do that. There’s always a sliding scale with these things and you assess different possibilities as you look at the market. You obviously have to factor it in because it does eat into the resources you have available to build a club in the here and now. We thought this was the best deal available to us and that’s why we did it.”
Because of the no-trade clause, the Cardinals and Red Sox had to loop in Gray and his agent, Bo McKinnis, early in the process. Fitts and Clarke were informed of the deal only when it was on the verge of becoming official late Tuesday morning.
“Certainly some complicated layers to this given the no-trade protection he had rightfully earned,” Breslow said. “As I was going back and forth with Chaim, we were trying to figure out the right approach to this. Everyone has their preferences and obviously, I deferred to him because Sonny was his player.
“Fortunately, Sonny was excited about the opportunity to come to Boston.”
In talks with the Red Sox, Bloom was likely able to touch base with some of his former lieutenants who are still with the club, like Brian O’Halloran, Eddie Romero, Mike Groopman and Raquel Ferreira. He had less familiarity, though, with the two players he acquired. While there are still a lot of players in the organization that Bloom acquired during his four-year run, neither Fitts nor Clarke fell into that bucket. Breslow traded for Fitts as part of the return package in a December 2023 trade that sent Alex Verdugo to the Yankees. It was also under Breslow that Clarke was drafted in the fifth round of the 2024 draft out of State College of Florida, Manatee-Sarasota.
Bloom was excited about the chance to add both pitchers. Fitts will compete for a rotation spot in spring training and Clarke, who is recovering from blister issues that shortened his season, will continue to develop in the middle levels of the minor leagues.
“It works out nicely that we do end up getting, in this trade, someone we feel is equipped to compete for a big league rotation spot right away (Fitts) and who we have a long runway with going forward,” Bloom said. “Obviously, in Clarke, you get somebody whose pure arm talent is right up there with just about anybody that is pitching in the minor leagues right now. Obviously, it’s a long way from that to establishing himself in the big leagues, but the upside is incredible there and we’re hopeful we can help him reach it.
“A lot of credit to the Red Sox for getting him where they did in the draft and then doing a good job with him early in his pro career … In terms of pure talent, in terms of what’s coming out of his hand, the extension that he gets, it’s up there with anybody that’s in the minor leagues. You really could put him on that short list of highest upside, most talented pitchers in the minor leagues.”