The last time John Henry spoke publicly it was February 17, 2020. Since then there has been 410 days and a last-place finish by the Red Sox.
Prior to the Sox' Opening Day game against the Orioles Friday at Fenway Park, the principal owner re-emerged, appearing on the Red Sox Radio Broadcast's pregame show along with chairman Tom Werner.
While a variety of topics were discussed by the two, including new minority owner LeBron James' role with the Red Sox, it was one part from Henry which helped summarize how he viewed his team's situation.
"In 2018 when we won, at that point it was clear to some of us in the organization if we didn’t pay more attention to the future than we were going to be in trouble," Henry said. "By the middle of 2019 it was clear that we had overplayed our hand, so to speak, in going for it. You can do that from time to time, but if you go for it every year in baseball. The only way you can do that is to have a very strong farm system and our farm system at that point was in really bad shape. So we knew at that point … Early on in 2019 I think we knew we were going to struggle and last year it was evident to everyone the lack of depth.
"Chaim has done a tremendous job of starting to strengthen the club, especially in regard to depth. You just can’t play a 162-game schedule in baseball without a certain amount of depth. Injuries are such a huge part of the game in the 21st century."
The quote lines up with Henry's comments to WEEI.com in London on the final days of June, when then-world champion Red Sox were struggling through the 2019 season.
"My take is that maybe it isn’t the best thing in the world to bring back the same team in its entirety every time," Henry said at the time. "You don’t want to break a team down. But maybe a few changes wouldn’t hurt. But the feeling is always different after you win, apparently."