Chris Cotillo on Chaim Bloom and the MLB trade deadline
Chris Cotillo of Masslive.com joined Mazz on The Baseball Hour ahead of the 2023 MLB Trade Deadline to discuss the latest on the Boston Red Sox.
What’s going to happen at the deadline?
Mazz: So Chris, some of the names that we’re just talking about there as we have this conversation, Adam Duvall, James Paxton, Alex Verdugo, these are all guys who are on the big league roster. And you mentioned the message to the rest of the clubhouse or how the certain moves would signal to the clubhouse that the Red Sox are giving up on 2023. I think you said the moving of Paxton would signal to the clubhouse that they’re giving up on the season. So let me ask you, have you been able to get any sense as to what the feeling is in the clubhouse as to what they’re going to do? Or is the clubhouse at all fearful that the organization is going to give up on the season by trading away veterans?
Chris Cotillo: You know, last year I don’t think that Chaim Bloom and the front office looked at it as giving up. I think they looked at it as Christian Vazquez goes out and Jake Diekman goes out, but Reese McGuire comes in and he was actually very good down the stretch and then Tommy Pham and Eric Hosmer, those guys obviously, Pham struggled and Hosmer played, but he figured after that that the team was actually in a better spot. You know, you take a hit at catcher, but you get a first baseman, you get an outfielder. He thought the team was probably more functional or more talented down the stretch. I think that the kind of emotional impact of that, where you lose a veteran and a leader like Vazquez, just what the what that guy meant, I think that that kind of took its toll. We heard Bogaert’s comments the next day in Houston and all that. I think this year like if they kind of toe that line and thread the needle well the perception might not be that way. Like if they went and traded Paxton in one deal and got back a controllable starter, one guy that went off the market today Aaron Civale from Cleveland to Tampa Bay, like that’s a guy that probably would have fit. If you trade Paxton you cash in on you know two months of him knowing that he’s a free agent, injury prone guy and pitched really well and go out and get the guy with two or three years of control like that makes some sense where, you know, your team’s not going to be worse off for the rest of the year and you’ll have more control down the line and you’ll have whatever prospects come for Paxton. I just think it’s tough to always be trying to make those moves that fit in. It’s always easier to make the one move than a series that all fit together. And last year I think they got too cute in that respect and didn’t really consider what impact it would have behind the scenes. And we saw that. So I think that they’re going to be more hesitant to kind of…
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS – JANUARY 15: Red Sox Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom looks on during a press conference addressing the departure of Alex Cora as manager of the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park on January 15, 2020 in Boston, Massachusetts. A MLB investigation concluded that Cora was involved in the Houston Astros sign stealing operation in 2017 while he was the bench coach. (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
Mazz: Do the same thing over again?
Chris Cotillo: Yeah, but it seem like they’re waving the white flag. But it is important to note that there are guys that want them to add. Kenley Jansen has been very, very vocal with that for the last few weeks. Rafael Devers talked to The Globe yesterday about it. So there are guys that have said that we want them to add, you know, guys like Paxton and some of these others have said, you know, I’d like to stay, but we understand the business. So I think they’re still assessing a lot of different possibilities. And on our Here it is.
Chaim Bloom joins @ChrisCotillo and @Sean_McAdam on the pod leading up to next week’s deadline
- More on the Kikè trade
- Lessons from last year’s deadline
- This trade deadline’s market
- Craziest deadline memories
- And much morehttps://t.co/60jkRN9gjp
Listen to the full interview with Chris Cotillo!
