Boston Red Sox
“It’s something that we’ve talked about, but no concrete plans.”
The Red Sox’ search for a general manager has taken a turn following an assistant GM’s recent departure.
Two weeks after announcing that he planned to hire a GM after the season, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow, as well as president Sam Kennedy, told The Boston Globe’s Tim Healey that the organization is taking a step back from the hiring hunt.
“It’s something that we’ve talked about, but no concrete plans,” Kennedy said to Healey following Thursday’s season-ending Wild Card series loss to the New York Yankees.
“It’s something that I will take stock of once we get through [the postseason],” Breslow said. “I’ll figure out how we want to put the front office together in a way that is best for the organization.”
The shift comes in the wake of former Boston assistant GM Paul Toboni being hired as the Washington Nationals’ president of baseball operations on Wednesday. Toboni, who originally joined the Red Sox as an intern in 2015, ascended through the front office ranks and appeared poised to be named Boston’s GM had he not accepted the Nationals gig.
Toboni spoke about his decision to leave the Red Sox and take over Washington’s rebuild.
“To be honest, at the start I wasn’t totally sure I was going to be interested,” Toboni said. “My wife and I are pretty unique in that we had told ourselves we were going to keep a pretty high bar for the opportunity that might come our way as it relates to this position.”
As for Boston, throughout Breslow’s two-year tenure as CBO, the club has yet to name a GM. The last person to hold such a title was Brian O’Halloran during Chaim Bloom’s CBO tenure from 2019-23. Upon Breslow being hired in October 2023, O’Halloran was named the Red Sox’ executive vice president of baseball operations.
Here’s how a team’s general manager role differs from its CBO or POBO, according to MLB.com.
“In most organizations, the general manager has final say in terms of roster decisions (e.g. trades, free-agent signings) and coaching/front office personnel (e.g. hiring, firing, promotions, reassignments),” per the league. “In organizations that employ a president of baseball operations, the general manager is considered second in command. Not every club employs a president of baseball operations, though some examples include the 2016 Cubs (Theo Epstein), ’16 Dodgers (Andrew Friedman) and ’16 Indians (Chris Antonetti).
“General managers have a number of assistants, as well as scouts and statistical analysts, working underneath them. Additionally, general managers also act as a face of a franchise in terms of speaking to the media and making public appearances.”
Given this description, it would be interesting to see how Breslow’s role changes if and when Boston lands a GM. Currently, Breslow is the team’s de facto GM, but surely goes through ownership before making major decisions (ex. the Rafael Devers trade).
After being the organization’s acting GM for two seasons, how would Breslow respond to going through a new GM to have his proposals approved? Considering an August report from USA Today’s Bob Nightengale in which he said GMs “hate dealing with the Red Sox and Craig Breslow in particular,” perhaps the team believes that hiring a GM is crucial heading into this offseason.
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