Aroldis Chapman has a 0.83 ERA through 22 games. He has converted 28 consecutive saves across two seasons. Multiple reports have the odds of a trade before August 3 at 90%. The Red Sox are 29-41, in last place in the AL East, 13.5 games out of first.
Craig Breslow says the team is “buying, not selling.”
Okay.
Chapman is earning $13.3 million this year to be the best closer in baseball, wasted on a roster so broken that the team CEO called the season “embarrassing, unacceptable, maddening, frustrating.” Boston is not contending. The Padres, Cubs, Braves, Phillies, Mariners, and Blue Jays are all circling. Bob Nightengale wrote in June that Chapman is “expected to join his eighth different team” and is “the top reliever available on every contender’s target list.” He has a point. You do not find a sub-1.00 ERA closer sitting in the deadline scrap heap every summer.
The thing that makes this funny — not funny funny, but Red Sox funny — is how familiar it feels. Breslow has now presided over three trade deadlines. In 2024, he traded nine prospects for five rentals who underperformed. In 2025, he got Steven Matz and Garrett May for three prospects. Both bombed. This is a man with a documented inability to commit to a direction, and now he’s doing the same song in public: buying, not selling, while the team is in last place.
Aroldis Chapman has retired 50 consecutive batters, so the equivalent of nearly two perfect games.
The last time he gave up a hit?
Would you believe July 23? https://t.co/seLqy8UxGk— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) September 8, 2025
Chapman himself says he wants to stay. “My mentality is to stay here and win here. Try to turn things around,” he told reporters in June, through a translator. That quote should make every Red Sox fan feel something, because he means it, and the team around him is a tire fire he can’t put out one save at a time.
Aroldis Chapman as a rental has one hell of a track record: he is 2-for-2 closing rings. The Cubs traded for him at the 2016 deadline for Gleyber Torres and three other prospects, and he helped them win the World Series. The Rangers acquired him at the 2023 deadline, and he helped them win the World Series. The man is a closer who wins championships for other teams. Boston is on the verge of handing that to someone else because Craig Breslow wants to pretend the standings do not exist.
WEEI’s Rob Bradford reported the team has actually been declining trade offers. Which means the calls are coming in, the interest is real, and Boston is currently saying no to premium returns for a one-year rental who will walk after the season anyway. His $13 million mutual option for 2027 is almost certainly not getting picked up by either side. The only question is whether Boston maximizes the return window or waves goodbye to Chapman in November and gets nothing.
There is a version of this offseason where Breslow gets a legitimate package back and uses it to start building something real. The Cubs got Gleyber Torres for a playoff run. The bar is set. The calls are coming. At some point you have to stop pretending the 29-41 record says something different than what it says.
Trade him. Get the Gleyber Torres equivalent. Stop telling us you’re buying.
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Sources: Lou Merloni / SI on Chapman dilemma | Bob Nightengale / USA Today | Chapman quote via NESN | Breslow on trade deadline via MLB Trade Rumors
