A message worth repeating
Dombrowski discovers that it’s not about winning in Boston … it’s winning again
Dave Dombrowski found out the hard way that baseball operates a lot differently in Boston. It’s the epitome of a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately kind of town.
That’s why Dombrowski is suddenly out of work after Boston decided to part ways with the 63-year-old team president late Sunday night. Most executives would be happy to win three division titles and a World Series in a lifetime. Dombrowski did that all within three years and it still wasn’t enough to keep his job.
The news may have come as a surprise to some, but not to those who have been following the Red Sox closely throughout the year. Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy first hinted at the potential for change several weeks ago and Dombrowski’s future had been a hot topic of debate ever since.
The anticipated move came this week as the Red Sox prepare to open a threegame series against the Blue Jays at Rogers Centre. Boston arrives in Toronto reeling after having lost back-toback series to the Twins and Yankees. A 5-5 record over its last 10 games essentially eliminated any chance of getting back into the playoff race as Boston trails Oakland by eight games for the second wild-card spot with 19 games to play.
There are suggestions that Dombrowski was removed from his position because he is viewed as a relic from a different era — a front office executive who refused to embrace the new wave of analytics and instead favoured a more old-school approach based on scouts and eye tests. He had a high-risk, high-reward approach when most organizations are more concerned about their floor than the ceiling.
Boston made a series of high-profile acquisitions during Dombrowski’s tenure that resulted in its minor-league system going from one of the strongest in the game to somewhere in the bottom third. Red Sox owner John Henry determined enough wasn’t being done to build a sustained winner.
But what did the Red Sox expect? The reasons Boston dumped Dombrowski are the same reasons he was their top choice to run the front office in 2015. Former GM Ben Cherington, now an assistant GM with the Blue Jays, was praised for his work with the farm system. The issue was a lack of wins at the big-league level.
Boston’s system was loaded with homegrown talent — Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts, Andrew Benintendi, Jackie Bradley Jr., Rafael Devers — but a pair of last-place finishes in the American League East in 2014 and 2015 cost Cherington his job and paved the way for Dombrowski, who was tasked with turning things around overnight.
The promise of a high payroll and freedom to make big moves were at least two reasons why Dombrowski
chose the Red Sox over other teams, such as the Blue Jays, in 2015. He quickly traded for all-star closer Craig Kimbrel and signed former Jay David Price. A year later, he made a blockbuster deal for perennial Cy Young candidate Chris Sale. Next, he brought in slugger J.D. Martinez.
There were other moves that paid off. Dombrowski pulled off a minor mid-season trade with the Jays last year for utility man Steve Pearce, who went on to win the World Series MVP award. A deal for Rays starter Nathan Eovaldi worked out equally as well. The flurry of moves was one reason Boston picked up its ninth title.
All that success has been forgotten within a span of 10 months. The defending World Series champions are more concerned with looking forward than reminiscing about the past. Martinez can opt out of his deal this off-season, Betts is one year away from free agency, and an aging pitching staff is full of holes.
Payroll is a concern with Sale, Price and Eovaldi set to earn $79 million (U.S.) next year alone. Add guaranteed salaries for Bogaerts and Dustin Pedroia and that number jumps to more than $110 million before Martinez’s contract situation is resolved or an extension with Betts is discussed.
The Red Sox have problems, which is good news for the Jays and the rest of the East. The farm system isn’t deep and the multimillion-dollar cheques might be starting to run out.
Dombrowski has learned how fickle the New England market can be. John Farrell left Toronto for his dream job in Boston after the 2012 season and one a World Series a year later. Four years after that he was unemployed despite back-to-back 93-win seasons. Cherington, another architect of a World Series, didn’t even last four years.
Boston demands the best and expects the worse. It’s not a city for the faint of heart and one of the most decorated general managers of his era knows all too well that even a World Series isn’t enough to avoid being kicked the curb. Only in Boston is the term “defending champions” not enough.
The Blue Jays comparison: Mark Shapiro was hired as Toronto’s club president around the same time Dombrowski was handed the keys in Boston. But the men were brought in to do very different jobs.
Talks with Shapiro began when the Blue Jays were on the verge of embarking on an ambitious rebuild. An unexpected run to the AL championship series altered the short-term goals but the vision pitched to Toronto’s ownership group involved a full teardown and complete overhaul of the minor-league system. You can argue whether it was the proper strategy, but that was the agreed-upon mandate. Dombrowski, on the other hand, was hired to make big moves and win immediately.
The Sanchize no more: Aaron Sanchez should serve as a warning for a rebuilding team like the Jays: even highly touted prospects come with a huge amount of risk. Sanchez was supposed to be the saviour of the Toronto rotation, someone who would keep the team in contention well after the likes of Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion had left town. Instead, the Jays got one big year as a starter, a couple of half-season runs as a reliever and not much else.
Sanchez is 27 years old and already appears to be at a crossroads in his career after recurring blister issues in 2017 and 2018 and a shoulder injury that ended his season this year in Houston. Since winning the AL ERA title in 2016, Sanchez has thrown 272 innings over the last three years combined and is now a candidate to be non-tendered. There is plenty of time for this to change, but right now Sanchez is a story of what could have been instead of what was.