«Last year's team was a pretty young team. There were guys who got to Double-A for the first time and they held their own. We may feel, by the end of March, they could benefit from a little more time in Double-A.»

«All I can say is we're actively looking for a center fielder.»

«Personally, it's been a distraction. It's been an interesting couple months. We've been short staffed, we've all been wearing a lot of different hats and there's a lot of gray area that we've never had in the past. Of course it's hard to focus on our farm system through that.»

«It's hard because the [New York] Yankees have double the money we do so it's a challenge to use our farm system even more. Everyone focuses on Major League moves because that's what people watch, but they don't realize it all stems from the Minors.»

«It's a challenge because we all love winning. We're trying to find the balance between doing something that will make us happy today but could hurt us in the future. It's not necessarily true that making a move to help the team this season won't benefit us later.»

«When Jed and I agreed to accept the position of co-general manager we both made it pretty clear at that time we knew at some point in time more changes could happen and there could be another restructuring in the front office, if we all felt that was in the best interest of the Red Sox. That would mean Theo's return. So we see this as a successful outcome. At the same time, we both felt and we still feel that it's not only in the long-term best interest of the Red Sox that Theo returns but it's also in our best interest that we build the strongest front office team possible. We benefit from that, too.»

«He was a shortstop in high school and for whatever reason got into the lineup at Stanford first as a second baseman. He could always go back there, but we feel he has a chance to play short and he really wanted to do it.»

«He's got on-base skills and the ability to be a plus defensive center fielder.»

«He was our hottest pitcher and we had a real need. We thought it was the best thing we could do for the major-league team.»

«In the long run, I don't think (being called up last year) will hurt him. Did it have a short-term impact? I'm sure it did to some degree. But he's got incredible makeup, toughness. He's going to be a good major-league pitcher.»