Remembering Dave Dombrowski From A Red Sox Perspective
All we have right now in baseball is historical moments to look back on with corona going on. I want to take this time to do a remembrance of Dave Dombrowski during his tenure with the Boston Red Sox. Dombrowski was an important figure in the history of the Red Sox. Dombrowski was the right man the job when he got hired and deserved to be fired when he eventually got let go. Dombrowski’s aggressive nature was his biggest strength and weakness.
MLB Trade Rumors recently put together an entire list of transactions that Dave Dombrowski made during his tenure. It’s a good reference point for background information when talking about the trades.
Dombrowski came to the Red Sox at a perfect point. He was the right man for the job. The Sox had a ready to win now young core. Something that’s very rare in today’s game. What Boston needed was someone to be aggressive and strike during that window. Say less when it comes to Dombrowski. Not to mention the decision to hire Alex Cora.
During that 2015-2016 offseason, Dombrowski got his ass to work. He signed David Price and traded for Craig Kimbrel. The team was good but it needed that one last punch. The bold trade for Chris Sale is what put the Red Sox over the top. The Nathan Eovaldi acquisition was the perfect deadline move. It created maybe the best team in the history of the sport. Boston won 108 games that year and torched pretty much everybody all postseason long. They ripped the hearts out of the Yankees, Astros, and Dodgers on the way to a championship.
Then there was the bad. Bad draft class after bad draft class left the farm system barren. Dumb trades that accomplished nothing other than trying to be aggressive made matters worse. Why are you giving up a top prospect for Drew Pomeranz? The Tyler Thornberg and Carson Smith trades were awful. Dombrowski could never build a bullpen. Don’t even get me started on Andrew Cashner. Eventually, Dombrowski dug such a massive hole that it forced the Red Sox into trading Mookie Betts.
At the end of the day, Dave Dombrowski should be remembered positively. He was the perfect man for the job at the perfect time. He also dug his own grave and deserved to be fired. Dombrowski will always be rememberd as the matermind behind the 2018 Red Sox and for that I say thank you.
