The Boston Red Sox just offloaded the remaining eight and a half years and $250 million of Rafael Devers’ mega-contract, with the San Francisco Giants taking on every cent left on the deal as part of Sunday night’s blockbuster trade.
Some Red Sox fans were quick to point out that one of John Henry’s other teams, Premier League club Liverpool, is on the verge of spending more than $200 million in the summer transfer window as they look to defend their Premier League title.
Henry and Fenway Sports Group have long insisted that each team they own is operated as a separate business, with one team’s success, failures or financial outlook having no effect on any others. Still, the timing of the Devers trade and Liverpool’s spending had some in Boston wondering just how true those claims are.
Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow joined The Greg Hill Show Tuesday morning for the “Front Office Report” and vehemently denied that Liverpool’s finances have ever been a part of any conversation he has had with Henry. Listen to the full interview above.
“That's not just a stretch; it's just completely untrue,” Breslow said. “In none of the conversations that I have with John, with ownership about our resources is the financial implications or situations of any of the other teams a topic. The Red Sox are run independently of any of those other organizations, and the timing here was just a matter of lining up on getting the right players back and finding the right situation that represented a trade that we needed to make.”
Breslow also denied a report from Geoff Pontes of Baseball America that Henry vetoed a different Devers trade because the Red Sox would have needed to retain some of his contract.
“No,” Breslow said when asked if that was accurate. “When I read that, I was as surprised as anybody else would have been who had no idea that this was a thing or had happened. Absolutely not true.”
Asked by Greg Hill if he could commit to spending the money saved by this trade elsewhere to improve the team, Breslow said that is “the intention.”
“That’s the intention,” Breslow said. “I understand the fans’ criticism and even outrage over this, but in no way is this signaling that we don't believe in our 2025 team. It was a conversation that I had with a majority of the players yesterday, on a one-on-one basis, was making sure that these guys understood that we went into this season believing that we were capable of a deep postseason run, and that has not changed at all. We brought back some pieces that we feel like could address areas of need, and we have resources now to continue to look to improve and upgrade the team as we approach the deadline.”