The Red Seat Podcast: Chad Jennings of The Athletic Talks Chaim Bloom and Alex Cora

On episode #284 of The Red Seat Podcast, Chad Jennings of The Athletic joined Jake Devereaux, Keaton DeRocher, and Bob Osgood to talk about the ups and downs of Chaim Bloom and Alex Cora’s tenures. He also discussed with us the state of the current Red Sox roster and what changes may lie ahead later this year, and beyond. You can find Chad’s great work at The Athletic here, as well as follow him @ChadJennings22 on Twitter.

We opened the show by evaluating the Chaim Bloom Era in year four. The lack of aggressiveness in free agency, while bringing a more modern approach to the organization, has produced a mixed bag of results. We discussed Bloom’s method of signing veterans to 1-to-2 year deals on shorter money, how it was a mistake to sign Corey Kluber over some more viable alternatives last winter, and whether there is any reason to think this mindset will change in the upcoming free agencies of players like Shohei Ohtani or Juan Soto.

In regards to Alex Cora, Chad shared some of his observations of where Cora has been great in the clubhouse while also reviewing his strengths and weaknesses as an in-game manager. If this season ends up as another last-place finish, even with a winning record, what kind of shake-up could we see going into next season? If either Bloom or Cora has to go, who would management choose?

From there, we reviewed how unprepared the team was at shortstop this year and how little has been done in-season to fix the problem. Why is Trevor Story so intent on playing shortstop and would it make more sense to deploy him at second base, rather than a packed designated hitter pool, while we wait for his arm to get to full strength? We discussed Triston Casas’ quirks, his defensive approach (or lack thereof at times), and Chad told some equally quirky Ichiro Suzuki stories from his time covering the Yankees. Finally, we talked about Chad’s monthly article recapping the key stories down on the farm, where some lower-level arms have started to emerge in recent weeks.

If you have a question for an upcoming Red Seat pod, you can email us at redseatpodcast@gmail.com or tweet us. Jake is @DevJake, Keaton is @TheSpokenKeats and Bob is @BobOsgood15. Thanks for listening!