LAS VEGAS — For the first time in four autumns, Chaim Bloom finds himself running an organization as baseball’s offseason begins. Six weeks after taking over for John Mozeliak as the Cardinals’ president of baseball operations, Bloom is at the general managers meetings in Las Vegas ready to begin his second stint in the big chair.
As he assumes the No. 1 role in St. Louis, Bloom, now 42, knows more of what to expect than he did six years ago when he was hired as the chief baseball officer of the Red Sox, succeeding Dave Dombrowski. His four years in Boston, which ended with a somewhat surprising firing in September 2023, are far in the rearview mirror — but also instructive.
“For me, it’s just really taking away from that (stint) my own understanding of the level of alignment that’s needed throughout an organization to point it toward success,” Bloom said Monday at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas. “In this chair, you have to insist on that. You have to make sure, up and down the organization, that you’re setting that target really, really clearly for people about what needs to happen for the organization to succeed and that you’re holding people accountable to it.
“When you come into any organization, that creates change for everybody around you. It does take some work. Some of it’s going to happen naturally over time as relationships build. Some of it is work you really have to put in to make sure everybody really understands what the mission is and the roadmap you’ve charted to get there, and to be really clear and intentional about getting everybody on the same page and keeping the organization on target.”
When Bloom took over for Dombrowski just 14 months after the Red Sox won the 2018 World Series, he was tasked with rebuilding the organization’s pipeline, even if club officials insisted that the club intended on contending each season. A last-place finish in a shortened 2020 season preceded a remarkable turnaround in 2021, when the Red Sox exceeded expectations and finished two wins away from reaching the World Series. Back-to-back 78-win seasons in 2022 and 2023 put Bloom on the hot seat as he dealt with growing friction with manager Alex Cora about the team’s direction and mixed messaging from ownership on budgeting and goals, especially in the short-term.
While the Red Sox faced the Yankees in Game 1 of a meaningless day-night doubleheader at Fenway Park on September 14, 2023, the club announced Bloom’s immediate departure in an email to reporters. He issued a short statement the next day but had not talked in depth about the end of his Boston tenure before Monday. Asked if he thought his firing was fair, Bloom — who was said to be caught off guard by the news when it was delivered to him at Fenway that day — deflected.
“No one ever promised that this game is going to be fair,” Bloom said Tuesday. “That’s just not something the game owes us. The game really doesn’t owe us anything.
“It’s really not something I think is worth reflecting on,” he continued. “It’s like that line from ‘A League of Their Own.’ It’s supposed to be hard. That’s why you celebrate so much when you do win something because it’s not easy to get there.”
Bloom has long acknowledged that his legacy in Boston was largely determined in his first spring training on the job, when he pulled the trigger on the blockbuster, franchise-altering trade that sent Mookie Betts (and David Price) to the Dodgers for Alex Verdugo, Jeter Downs and Connor Wong. That move, driven by principal owner John Henry’s desire to cut payroll to avoid competitive balance tax thresholds and the organization’s frustration over not being able to reach an extension with Betts, has haunted the Red Sox for a half-decade. Betts has added three World Series rings, four All-Star appearances and three top-five finishes since the trade while none of the three players acquired for him became stars or even long-term regulars. Since 2020, the Dodgers have won more World Series than the Red Sox have postseason series.
Bloom said his thoughts on making the trade haven’t changed much since the day it happened in February 2020.
“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.”
In the wake of his firing, Bloom kept a low-profile but remained in the area, choosing for family reasons to continue living full-time in a Boston suburb as he awaited his next opportunity. In January 2024, the Cardinals hired him as a front office advisor with a focus on player development, then after that season, announced a succession plan that called for Bloom to take over for Mozeliak, who had led the club’s front office since 2007. Bloom remained local for much of the last two seasons while taking trips to St. Louis and plans to relocate there more permanently in the near future. He has still not left an area he first came to call home when he was hired away from the Rays six years ago.
“I have a lot of family ties to Boston,” Bloom said. “My family and I have loved living there. Boston fans are great. I said that to our media right after I was fired. I believed it then, I believe it now. Tremendous fans. They have been great to be around the last couple of years. They really care a lot about the team and follow closely. They appreciate everything that goes into it and they’ve been absolutely great to me.”
Bloom has been focused on rebuilding the Cardinals for the last two seasons, but he acknowledged he has paid attention to the Red Sox as well. A lot of the players that fueled Boston’s return to the postseason in 2025 were Bloom additions, from draft picks like Roman Anthony and Connelly Early to trade, free agent and Rule 5 additions like Wilyer Abreu, Garrett Whitlock and Trevor Story.
“It’s cool to see them, in a lot of cases, start turning into — and in other cases, continuing to be — the players we thought they could be,“ Bloom said. ”Even in just four years in that organization, I developed a lot of really strong relationships and friends for life. Some people that I care about that I was really happy to see enjoy pieces of that success.
“I’m proud of a lot of the things we did in Boston. It has been exciting from afar to see that work come to fruition. Bigger things continue to be ahead for that franchise.”
Bloom would be the first to admit that his ending in Boston wasn’t perfect and that the organization, under his guidance, never reached the goals he set out for it. His four years weren’t perfect, of course, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t look back at them fondly.
“I feel the same way I felt about it when I was doing it,” Bloom said Tuesday at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas. “I loved it.
“I’m proud of the work and proud of the things we were able to accomplish. Would love to have seen it through. But I’m also really happy for all the experiences I had since that happened, the ways in which I was able to grow reflecting on it, and I’m really excited for the challenge I have in front of me now.”
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