BY IAN BROWNE
When the Red Sox brought on Chaim Bloom
to lead their baseball operations department last
Oct. 28, they did so with a fancy new title that
left no doubt about who would be in charge.
Bloom became the first chief baseball officer in
club history. However, when it comes to Bloom,
the CBO might as well stand for collaborative
baseball officer.
Yes, Bloom will lead the baseball operations
department for what the Red Sox hope will be
many years. But he will do it with his favorite
method of leadership – collaboration. That style
couldn’t be more perfect considering the four
people in the office with whom Bloom works
the closest.
After the Red Sox let Dave Dombrowski go back
in September, ownership had such trust in
the quartet of Brian O’Halloran, Eddie Romero,
Raquel Ferreira and Zack Scott that the four of
them were set free to run the department until
the club found a new baseball ops leader.
As they bridged the gap before Bloom’s arrival,
they became known as the Gang of Four. Together,
they have a total of 69 years of experience
working for the Red Sox. Ferreira goes all the way
back to the Dan Duquette administration. All
four were there for the entirety of regimes led by
Theo Epstein, Ben Cherington and Dombrowski.
And one of the reasons the Red Sox chose
Bloom is because they thought he would be the
perfect person to lead a department that could
accentuate and further empower the Gang of
Four.
“This is a big job,” said Red Sox owner John
Henry. “It’s one of the reasons we came up with
the title we came up with for Chaim. Running
a major league organization, especially one as
large and complex as the Red Sox organization,
it’s obviously worth more than one person.
e d d i e ro_m__e_ro
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BILLIE WEISS
REDSOX.COM/MAGAZINE 39
/MAGAZINE