Craig Breslow Pushes Back On Red Sox Narrative After Rafael Devers Trade

The Boston Red Sox did not set out to cut salary in the Rafael Devers trade, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow said.

Boston dealt the star slugger to the San Francisco Giants on Sunday night in exchange for four players. San Francisco reportedly will take on every penny Devers has remaining on his 10-year, $313.5 million contract that runs through 2033, which equates to $254 million in salary.

While it’s been speculated the Red Sox partnered with the Giants because of that benefit, Breslow stressed it was neither a mandate nor condition during trade discussions.

“There was no mandate,” Breslow told reporters during a video conference Monday night, as seen on NESN. “The mandate is to assemble the best team that we possibly could.”

When asked if unloading the balance of Devers’ salary was a “condition” in order to make the deal, Breslow replied: “No, we were trying to improve the long and short-term outlooks. We were trying to provide some additional roster flexibility. And we were trying to make the best baseball trade that we could.”

Red Sox president and CEO Sam Kennedy also spoke to reporters and said the reasoning for the trade was because the ballclub and Devers had differing views of his role. The two sides couldn’t find “alignment,” Kennedy said, despite all levels of the organization trying to work with Devers over a period of several months.