Chaim Bloom Says Jeter Downs Decision Was ‘Tough One’ For Red Sox

Chaim Bloom has had to make a lot of tough decisions since joining the Boston Red Sox and this one was no different.

The Red Sox designated shortstop Jeter Downs for assignment Thursday to make room for newly signed outfielder Masataka Yoshida on the 40-man roster. The decision to move on from the 24-year-old certainly wasn’t an easy decision as he was, of course, the second player along with Alex Verdugo who came back in the Mookie Betts trade with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Red Sox chief baseball officer detailed how making the decision wasn’t easy but the fact Downs was a part of the Betts trade didn’t factor in, either.

“I don’t think it changes what the decision is,” Bloom said, as transcribed by MassLive’s Chris Cotillo, “Because ultimately we have our responsibility to every player in this organization to make the right decision by all of them when we’re making decisions for the organization. No doubt he was a big part of a really significant trade. That we haven’t gotten him to the level we expected hurts. But at the end of the day, we want to do right by all of our players and he was the right decision, we thought, in this case.”

Bloom noted it was the struggles the shortstop had experienced since acquiring him that led to this “tough” decision.

‘We knew, adding Masa, that we’d have a tough decision to make,” Bloom said, as transcribed by Cotillo. “That’s where we are with our 40-man. This is a good thing for the roster but there are only tough decisions from here on out. And this was a tough one. The fact that he was in a position where we considered him and chose him to be designated, I think just speaks to some of the struggles we’ve had getting him on track. I still think there’s a lot of physical ability there but we haven’t been able to unlock it consistently. Certainly know he’s still young and there’s no reason to write him off but he has obviously had some struggles.”

Downs’ career with the Red Sox included 14 games in the majors where he hit .154 with one home run and a .427 OPS this past season.