Red Sox's Dave Dombrowski Keeping Open Mind About Trade Possibilities

Dave Dombrowski never has considered a player “untouchable.”

While there certainly are some players Dombrowski would prefer not to trade in his new role as Boston Red Sox president of baseball operations, the longtime Major League Baseball executive also understands the importance of not completely shutting the door on anything.

“I used to say, well, if you have a guy like a Barry Bonds in his prime, and all of a sudden somebody came around and offered you two Barry Bonds’, you’d say, ‘Yeah, I’m open-minded to that,’ ” Dombrowski said Thursday on WEEI’s “Dennis and Callahan” of no player being entirely off-limits. “I would make that move, so I don’t think you have untradeable players.

“There are players that are more difficult to trade depending on how your club sets up, but I think you’re very open-minded to anything because you need to have an open mind in order to make deals happen.”

Dombrowski has a reputation of trading prospects for veteran players, which creates an intriguing situation for the Red Sox, who have one of the best farm systems in baseball. Such a dynamic doesn’t necessarily mean Dombrowski is going to unload the farm before next season, though. He simply intends to consider all possibilities as he looks to turn around a Red Sox team facing its third last-place finish in four seasons — with a World Series title sprinkled in, of course.

“You need to be open-minded to move guys around in your club that fit best,” Dombrowski said. “I think if you start saying to a lot of clubs, ‘Well these guys are untradeable players,’ and a lot of times that even is for young players in a system where somebody will say, ‘That guy’s untouchable.’ Well, there are guys that exist like that, but there really are not that many of them because the reality is that guys are prospects for a reason.

“I like young players, I like when young players are meshed in an organization,” he added. “That’s what’s really great here — you see some really good young players at the major league level and some other guys in the minor league system. I have built with young players in Montreal and in Florida, but then also enhanced those guys with trades and free-agent signings, so there’s all different ways to go about it. But I think you need to be open-minded in every circumstance to make your club better.”

Dombrowski’s hiring could lead to a philosophical change in Boston, but the organization’s No. 1 goal remains the same: winning.

It’ll be interesting to see what Dombrowski considers to be the best means to that end.