Looking Back Upon Old Trades: #5 Craig Breslow Acquires a Key Bullpen Arm

Welcome back for one last time. In the first four installments of this series, we looked at Theo Epstein and the Adrián González trade, Ben Cherington and the Eduardo Rodríguez trade, Dave Dombrowski and the Chris Sale trade, and Chaim Bloom's acquisition of Wilyer Abreu. We're now up to current President of Baseball Operations Craig Breslow. Breslow has had his fair share of trades despite being in the job for just over a year. Before we dive in, I should mention that I won’t discuss any trades made during this offseason, as we haven't had any time to analyze how they turned out. That means Garrett Crochet is off the table. Instead, we'll look at a trade that I feel may prove valuable in the long run, involving a 2023 draft pick and a current member of the Red Sox bullpen.

On December 6, 2023, the Red Sox made a deal with the Mets that looked at the time to be a simple case of acquiring a depth piece for the bullpen. The Mets had selected the pitcher in the Rule 5 Draft, so the stakes were low: if he had a good spring, he could break camp with the Red Sox, and if not, they could just send him right back to Texas. That pitcher was Justin Slaten. Slaten was coming off an impressive minor league season in 2023. The majority of his games were with double-A Frisco, where he pitched in 35 games and to a 3.16 ERA of 3.16 while striking out 76 batters in 51 1/3 innings. The strikeouts were nothing new, as he'd struck out more than 10 batters per inning in ever stop of his professional career (except for a one-appearance stop in rookie ball). All those K's hadn't necessarily turned into results, though, and he ended up as a Met when Texas chose not to protect him prior to the Rule 5 Draft.

Slaten wasn’t meant to be a Met for long, however. He got shipped to Boston for left-handed pitcher Ryan Ammons. Ammons was Boston's 10th-round draft pick in 2023, after pitching for four years at Clemson. Ammons never threw a single inning for the Red Sox after being drafted.

It's still early, but so far this trade looks like a win for both organizations. Ammons shined in his first season with the Mets organization, running a 2.18 ERA in 32 appearances across Low A and High A while striking out nearly 12 batters per nine innings. He really turned it up a notch once he was promoted to high-A Brooklyn. In 14 games, he threw 20 1/3 innings and struck out 25 batters with an ERA of 1.33. He surrendered just six hits and his WHIP was below 1.00.

The Red Sox shouldn’t be too worried about what they gave up, however. Slaten showed himself to be a dominant arm in Boston. After making the team out of spring training, Slaten spent the entire season in Boston (except for a single appearance in Portland as part of a rehab assignment after a stint on the IL). Appearing in 44 games in his rookie season, Slaten immediately proved himself a key piece of the bullpen. He ran a 2.93 ERA over 55 1/3 innings, striking out 58 batters and only walking nine. He went 6-2 with two saves, and the advanced stats liked him even better. His 2.61 FIP and 1.5 fWAR led all Sox relievers. He was especially dominant at home, running a 1.78 ERA in 19 games at Fenway over 25 1/3 innings. He also pitched well down the stretch, appearing in 13 games across August and September and running a 1.42 ERA in 12 2/3 innings.

Going into 2025, Slaten is already a key piece of manager Alex Cora’s bullpen, alongside veterans Liam Hendriks and Aroldis Chapman. While Breslow has so far frustrated Red Sox fans with his lack of big moves (with the obvious exception of the Crochet trade), he has succeeded in acquiring talent through what look at first blush like small moves, and then finding a way to maximize it. Slaten is just one example of that, and hopefully there are more to come.