The women’s basketball team at Rochelle Zell Jewish High School in Chicago was practicing earlier this month ahead of its annual Senior Night when an announcement came over the intercom, presenting a special guest. That’s where the video starts — one of those designed-to-go-viral tearjerkers showing a child reuniting with their parent who is in the military.

“He is joining us after leaving the military service in Europe,” the announcer says. Team members start to look around, smiling but confused, when they see that the door to the gym is open.  

“We are grateful for his dedication, especially his daughter Hannah,” the announcer continues. That’s when one athlete, in a long-sleeve practice jersey and a ponytail, begins to cry and run toward the door. “Thank you for your service and sacrifice, and welcome home, U.S. Army Chaplain Rabbi Aaron Melman.” Everyone cheers. Throwing her arms around her father, Hannah sobs.

Melman, a Conservative rabbi who since 2021 has served as a chaplain in the Illinois Army National Guard, had just returned from a U.S. Army base in Western Poland. He submitted his request for leave back in September but didn’t tell his daughter, who was devastated most of all to learn his deployment conflicted with the pinnacle of her high school basketball career. (She was more upset that he would miss that game than her graduation.) When she hugged him, Melman took off his cap and revealed a light brown yarmulke that matched his fatigues.

“We made it happen,” Melman tells his daughter in the video, smiling. Days later, RZJHS won at Senior Night. Hannah scored four points.

For more than two decades after he graduated from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2002, Melman was a congregational rabbi in the northern suburbs of Chicago. He had thought, early in his career, about joining the military — his father served in the U.S. Army Reserves — but decided against enlisting, recognizing that serving in active duty would be challenging as he raised two young children. 

But later, when his kids were older, the itch to serve returned. Melman was commissioned as an officer in the Illinois Army National Guard, a responsibility that typically required two days of service a month and two weeks each year, until he was sent to Poland earlier this year. That assignment made him one of several Jewish chaplains serving on the front lines of Europe, providing religious support and counseling to American soldiers — most of whom are not Jewish — who are stationed in Germany, Poland and other allied nations largely as a bulwark against Russia. 

Many Jewish chaplains serve in the military only part-time. They fit the training into already-busy schedules leading congregations and providing pastoral care to people in their own communities. 

Several military rabbis told JI that they view their mission as more than counseling the soldiers in their care and helping them deal with the hardships of military service. They explained that it’s also about reminding American Jews — many of whom have parents or grandparents who fought in World War II, Korea or Vietnam — about the value of service. During World War II, the military printed pocket-sized Hebrew bibles for Jewish soldiers. Today, some Jews don’t know anyone serving in the military. 

“Most Jews in America are not connected in any way, shape or form to the United States Armed Forces. The common reaction many of us get, when we go into the armed forces here in the States is, ‘Oh, you don’t want to go into the IDF?’ or, ‘Why didn’t you go into the IDF?’ And for the record, I happen to be a very strong Zionist,” Melman told Jewish Insider in an interview last week. “One of the things for me that I’ve really grown to appreciate is trying to connect the younger generation of American Jews into joining or thinking about joining the military and how important it is.”

Rabbi Aaron Gaber spent nine months at Grafenwoehr, a major American base in Germany, starting last summer. As a member of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, his unit’s mission was to train Ukrainian soldiers, and Gaber was tasked with training Ukrainian chaplains. He took them to the Memorium Nuremberg Trials, a museum located inside the German courtroom where Nazi leaders were tried for their crimes after World War II. 

“That created a whole conversation about moral integrity and personal courage. How do you say to your commander, ‘Don’t commit atrocities’? Or how do you keep your soldiers who are angry at what’s happening and want to do things that are unethical or immoral from doing that?” Gaber told JI. “That elicited a whole conversation on a theological level about light versus darkness, good versus evil, but also then on a practical level: How do you advise your commander in a way that gives him or her the option not to do something that shouldn’t be done?”

Most of Gaber’s job, when dealing either with Ukrainian troops or American, involved assisting people who were not Jewish. 

“As a rabbi, I got to make sure every week there was a Protestant worship service happening,” said Gaber, who returned from Germany in June (and specified that he did not lead those services).

Last year, he volunteered to spend the High Holidays in Poland and Lithuania. He drove between several different bases to make sure Jewish soldiers had access to religious services, food and learning opportunities tied to the holidays. 

“I take the idea of ohr l’goyim, or bringing light to the world, I was able to bring light to the world. I was able to help Jewish soldiers celebrate their faith. If I met 10 Jewish soldiers through the entire two weeks, that was a lot. So it was individual work,” Gaber said. “In one case, I had one soldier travel, I think, three hours each way to be able to spend an hour with me. He couldn’t go by himself, so he had a noncommissioned officer, one of his squad leaders, go with him. That was the length that the military can and does go to make sure soldiers can access their faith.” 

Ohr l’goyim is a phrase that comes up often for Jewish military chaplains. For Rabbi Laurence Bazer, a retired U.S. Army colonel who is now a vice president at the JCC Association and the Jewish Welfare Board’s Jewish Chaplains Council, those words — from the Book of Isaiah — commanded him to be a light unto the nations. “And that’s not just to our own fellow Jews, but to the rest of the community,” Bazer told JI. 

A friend of his from the North Dakota National Guard once took Bazer, who served in the Massachusetts Army National Guard, to visit North Dakota’s state partner in Ghana. He sat down with a group of Ghanaian soldiers and told them to ask him anything they might want to know about Judaism. 

“Now, these are all Catholic, Protestant and Muslim chaplains from the Ghanaian army,” Bazer recalled. “I said, ‘You could ask me, like, why Jews don’t believe in the New Testament, or Jesus, whatever.’ That’s part of the role that I love doing, of being, again, ohr l’goyim, a light unto the nations, to be able to share the positive, affirming side of Judaism so that they felt enriched. It was all in true fellowship of, we’re all servants of the Divine.” 

Bazer spent his final years in the military in Washington, working full time in an active duty role at the National Guard’s headquarters. He oversaw the religious response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 racial-justice protests and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. 

“I was advising commanders up to four stars at a senior level about what’s going on religiously, which really meant the moral welfare of their troops,” said Bazer, who had served in New York during the 9/11 attacks and later led the chaplaincy response to the Boston Marathon bombings in 2013. “That emotional level affects readiness, and chaplains are the key to help that readiness.” 

In 2023, Bazer was asked to go to Europe to lead Passover services and programming for Jewish troops. He led Passover Seders in Germany and Poland, and then drove between Lithuania and Latvia, delivering matzah and visiting with Jewish soldiers. 

The Seder at Grafenwoehr took place on a large lawn on the base. After he spoke about opening the door for the prophet Elijah, a symbolic act tied to hope that the Messiah will come, a Christian chaplain on base who had attended the Seder pulled Bazer aside. He pointed to a tower that stood next to the lawn.

“He says, ‘You know, Hitler used to go up there and watch,’” Bazer said. The base — now so central to America’s operations in Europe — was once used by the Nazis. “To think that back then he used to watch the Nazis do formation, and now, in 2023 we’re holding a Passover Seder on the same base in the shadow of that tower is an incredible experience.”

Growing up at a Reform temple in suburban Boston, Sarah Hurwitz learned that Judaism is just “four holidays, two texts and a few universalistic values.” 

When she left home, she largely eschewed all Jewish observance for two decades, she reflected in a recent interview with Jewish Insider. In that time, she got two degrees at Harvard and reached the pinnacle of Washington success, serving as a senior speechwriter, first to President Barack Obama and then to First Lady Michelle Obama. If she engaged with Judaism at all, it was with a light touch — she was merely a “cultural Jew,” as she usually called herself. 

“I just didn’t realize there was Jewish culture. I just meant, ‘Oh, I’m anxious and kind of funny,’” Hurwitz told JI last month. 

Approaching a midlife crisis, Hurwitz found her way to an intro to Judaism class at a Washington synagogue nearly a decade ago. She embarked on a journey of learning Jewish traditions and studying Jewish texts that sparked her first book, the 2019 Here All Along, a joyful and accessible primer to Judaism. 

“Its thesis was, ‘Isn’t Judaism amazing?’ Not a lot of Jews are going to disagree with that thesis,” Hurwitz said. 

She is doing something different with her new book, As A Jew: Reclaiming Our Story From Those Who Blame, Shame, and Try to Erase Us, which was published this week. 

“This is definitely a book with an argument. It is definitely edgier than my first book,” Hurwitz said. 

That’s because in As A Jew, Hurwitz is grappling with a question that struck at the core of who she is, or at least who she was until a decade ago. Why, she asks, was she always qualifying her Judaism? She was always a “cultural Jew,” an “ethnic Jew,” a “social justice Jew,” she writes. Hurwitz was never simply a Jew, one word, proud, head tall. 

In her new book, as she tackles the millennia of antisemitism that led her to unwittingly minimize her own identity, she is asking questions that others who similarly distort or diminish their Jewish identity may not want to face. 

“I was really trying to make others comfortable with me, right? I didn’t want them to think I was one of those really Jew-y Jews, which … why would that be bad, again?” Hurwitz said. “Why did social justice have to be my Judaism? Why couldn’t Judaism be my Judaism?”

This doesn’t mean Hurwitz is criticizing people who engage with Judaism through a social justice lens, or through culture, or any other avenue besides religious observance. Her own personal Jewish learning journey has not made her an Orthodox Jew. The argument she’s making is that Jews should engage with Judaism … well, Jewishly — by learning what Jewish texts have to say about social justice, rather than taking some universal values like “care for the vulnerable” and calling that your Judaism.

“Social justice is also a gorgeous way to be a Jew when you actually know what Judaism says about social justice,” said Hurwitz. “When I was this kind of contentless Jew, I don’t really know what I was doing. I was often just articulating my own views and opinions and kind of attributing them to Judaism.” 

She begins with a basic question: The Holocaust happened because the Nazis hated the Jews. But why did they hate the Jews? OK, the Jews were the scapegoat after World War I. But why the Jews? That unanswered question makes it hard for anyone to identify modern-day antisemitism, Hurwitz argues.

“These poor kids, it’s very confusing, because they’ve gotten Holocaust education, and they’re like, ‘That’s antisemitism education,’” said Hurwitz. “And then you get to campus and there are no Nazis, and you’re like, ‘What is this?’”

To answer that, she goes back thousands of years. The book examines Judaism in the context of the historical movements that have tried to crush it, or at least confine it: early Christianity, the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the Enlightenment, the Holocaust. Not each of these eras sought to eliminate Judaism, but each one presented a particular idea of the good kind of Jew. 

Throughout history, some Jews always tried to adapt to the mores of the day and disavow essential parts of Judaism in order to fit in. The only problem, writes Hurwitz, is it didn’t work. You can be Jewish, but not too Jewish. Like when modernity swept across Western Europe in the 19th century, and Jews could suddenly become citizens of France and Germany — so long as they placed their country’s identity above their Jewish identity.

“This book was very much my journey to stripping away all those layers of internalized antisemitism, anti-Judaism, all of that internalized shame from so many years of persecution, and just saying, ‘You know what, no, I’m a Jew,’” said Hurwitz.

Hurwitz pitched this book before the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks that sparked a wave of global antisemitism. But she says the events of the last two years have only furthered her argument that Jews throughout history have felt the need to separate from parts of their community to earn the approval of the rest of society.

“Oct. 7 did not change the overall argument at all. It unfortunately, in many ways, gave this devastating, heartbreaking, new evidence from the argument,” Hurwitz said. 

Hurwitz hopes to reach a broad audience. But she spent a decade and a half enmeshed in Democratic politics professionally, and she particularly hopes to can reach Jews on the left who have distanced themselves from Zionism partly as a condition of their belonging in progressive spaces. 

“I am hoping that I can speak particularly to Jews who maybe have identified as Democrats, who are a little bit more on the left, and I can tell them why I am a Zionist. I can tell them why I think it is so important that Israel exists,” Hurwitz said. “I can make that argument, and I’m hoping that it will be credible coming from me, in a way that maybe it wouldn’t from others.”

On Thursday morning, as Jews around the world woke to news of an antisemitic attack that left two young people dead in Washington, the team at Lehrhaus, a kosher restaurant near Boston, prepared for another day of service. That night, dozens of people — young and old, Orthodox and secular, Jewish and non-Jewish — stopped by this Jewish tavern and house of learning to gather with community and, of course, to eat delicious food. 

Among the guests at the popular Somerville, Mass., restaurant on Thursday night was Gov. Maura Healey, a first-time visitor to a place that has become an institution for Boston’s Jewish community since it opened in 2023. She spent nearly an hour there talking to diners and meeting Lehrhaus’ staff.

“I wanted them to know that I share their heartbreak and outrage over the murders of Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky, and that antisemitism has absolutely no place in Massachusetts,” Healey, a Democrat, told Jewish Insider in a statement. “Lehrhaus is a testament to the strength and spirit of the Jewish community in Massachusetts, especially during the most difficult times.”

At a Thursday morning meeting among senior leaders of Boston Jewish organizations, Rabbi Charlie Schwartz, the director of Lehrhaus, suggested that Healey should stop by in the coming days. Jeremy Burton, CEO of the Boston Jewish Community Relations Council, brought the idea to Healey — and within hours, she agreed to visit.

“Maybe not 10 or 15 minutes after Charlie and I spoke, the governor called me sometime before 10 a.m., and we had the kind of chat that we often have at times like this, where she’s expressing her concern, asking about the community, asking about what people are feeling and needing,” Burton said. “One of the things that we talked about was this issue of spaces of Jewish gathering, and this larger question of how to convey that Jews belong and Jews are valued, and Jewish spaces are valued, and it’s safe to gather.” 

By the time Healey stopped by, the restaurant was nearly full, with people sampling Jewish cuisine and Jewish-inspired cocktails from around the world. In the library, a class was going on — so packed that Healey had to wave rather than walking in to address the attendees. 

“I told her about Lehrhaus, about what we’re doing. I mentioned that we have the best fish and chips in Boston, according to Eater, and she definitely should come back and try them,” said Schwartz. 

With Healey’s visit, she came to “just hang out and speak to people, and just be present in a space that expresses the best of Jewish life, even in moments of real tragedy and pain,” Schwartz added. 

Like other Jewish institutions, Lehrhaus is well aware of security concerns, and regularly examines its security measures amid antisemitic threats. But it is not the kind of place where guests will find armed guards or metal detectors. 

“We understand that as a public-facing tavern and house of learning, where one of our main functionalities is being a bar and restaurant, there’s a different type of security posture that we have to have,” said Schwartz. “The type of security that we have is going to be very different than a museum or a synagogue or an embassy, but will still be present.” 

Lehrhaus is planning to open a second location in Washington, but they have not yet announced a timeline for the project. 

If jars of gefilte fish have expiration dates, Chaim Bloom does not want to know.

Bloom, a career-long baseball operations staffer and executive, gained attention in the Jewish press when it was revealed that he kept a 10-year-old jar of gefilte fish in his office. The product of Passover-time agreement, Bloom and his colleagues at the Tampa Bay Rays promised to share the divisive delicacy should they win the World Series.

Like the Hebrews wandering in the desert, it has taken longer than expected.

After 15 years with the Rays — during which he rose from intern to senior vice president for baseball operations — Bloom, 37, was hired by the division rival Boston Red Sox in October to be their next chief baseball officer. 

Naturally, the ever-ripening gefilte fish traveled with him to Fenway.

Bloom took charge of a team with impressive success in the 21st century. World Series wins in 2004, 2007, 2013 and 2018 made the Red Sox one of the most successful teams over the last 20 years. The always-ravenous New England-wide fanbase was further rewarded with six Super Bowl titles for the Patriots, one Stanley Cup for the Bruins and a Championship title for the Celtics.

For a sports region with such a high pedigree of success in recent years, anything less than a title is considered an off-year. With a market of critical sports columnists and talk-radio hosts that can make Capitol Hill reporters seem like Boy Scouts, job security comes at a premium.

While the Red Sox’s achievements abound, the last two World Series wins came amid seasons of underachieving to downright mediocre performances for the team. Dave Dombrowski, Bloom’s predecessor in Boston, was fired in October, just one year after constructing a roster that won a franchise-record 108 games.

Bloom, who speaks in a humble manner, wisely acknowledges the difficulty and scrutiny inherent to his job.

“I think it’s a testament to how much people in this region care about you. And so I view it as a positive that there is that level of interest and that level of passion,” Bloom told Jewish Insider. “You know, it’s certainly a much louder environment, a much more populous environment than I’m used to with the Rays.”

***

Bloom’s first major act was to trade homegrown superstar and fan-favorite Mookie Betts to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Betts, a five-tool outfielder, played with a level of consistency and athleticism that made him a statistical gem — all topped by the perfect baseball name. By all measures, Betts is one of the best players today and was on track to become one of the greatest in franchise history. In the all-important Wins Above Replacement (WAR) metric, he trails only Los Angeles Angels outfielder Mike Trout since entering the league in 2014. According to Baseball Reference, his 2018 MVP performance ranks second behind Carl Yastrzemski’s 1967 triple-crown performance as the best single season in Red Sox history.

Still, the decision to trade such a rare player was hardly surprising. Betts, whose contract ended after the 2020 season, was set to command an enormous deal. Toward the end of the season, it was widely rumored that the team was seeking to trade Betts rather than risk his leaving after 2020 without gaining anything in return.

When asked, Bloom rejected the presumption that trading Betts came with the job, emphasizing instead that it was a decision made after his arrival.

“It was an extremely difficult thing to do, to move on from him, especially after getting an appreciation of his talents for so many years,” said Bloom. “At the same time, it is something that we felt pretty strongly was the right thing for the organization given the importance of maintaining a sustainable core of talent.”

Still, Bloom recognizes the symbolic importance of exchanging Betts — who was traded along with veteran and former Cy Young award winning pitcher David Price — for three young prospects.

Bloom says he was impressed by the response he received in the clubhouse. “I know it wasn’t easy, but I was really blown away by the professionalism,” he said, “especially doing it so close to spring training and then seeing guys come in and just go about their work.”

***

Chaim Bloom looks out at Fenway Park in Boston in October 2019. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

A Philadelphia native, Bloom attended Jewish day school before matriculating at Yale University, where he graduated in 2004 with a degree in Latin Classics.

While reading Latin literature endows a knowledge of Roman warfare and the intricate ethics of leadership, a degree in the classics does not immediately translate into a profession obsessed with sabermetrics and advanced statistics.

“I’m not going to lay claim to being any kind of advanced mathematician. I would say it started with a passion for baseball and took a lot of persistence and a whole lot of good fortune,” Bloom explained.

“To the extent that any type of education is supposed to teach you how to learn, I think it’s helped with that,” he added of his studies. “There’s a lot of situations we face in this business and you know, really life, where it’s hard to study them specifically. And what you really need to tackle those situations is the ability to parse the situation, to work through problems creatively, to adapt. And I think the education I got prepared me well to do that.”

He joined the Rays, then known as the Devil Rays, after graduating college during a successful run that saw the team reach its first World Series in 2008. All the while, Bloom rose through the ranks, garnering the respect of his colleagues and the baseball world.

“Chaim is exactly what you’d want in a friend and colleague.” Rays chief baseball officer Matt Silverman told JI. “He’s thoughtful, dependable and full of integrity. And, of course, his intellect and wit are off the charts.”

Though Bloom declined to name his favorite Jewish baseball player — saying he does not “like to play favorites” — Bloom observes the importance of the American pastime when it comes to the American-Jewish experience.

“I do think when you look at the rise of baseball in this country in our society, I think it parallels the story of a lot of Jewish immigration into the country and establishing a larger foothold in the U.S.”

Despite reports, Bloom says he is not Shabbat observant. But the father of two prioritizes returning home for the start of each Shabbat before returning to the ballpark for any night games. In 2011, Bloom notably chose to skip the final game of the season, which coincided with Rosh Hashanah, even though it would decide if the Rays made the playoffs. The Rays ultimately won the game on a dramatic walk-off home run.

Unfortunately, with the delayed and shortened season unlikely to include fans, Bloom has yet to sample Fenway’s kosher offerings, which famously include glatt-kosher hot dogs from a vending machine. But baseball’s most famous Jewish food devotee can speak with certainty about the greater number of kosher choices in his new home city.

When the conversation with JI turned to the social reckoning following the police shooting of George Floyd, Bloom described a direct link between his belief in the need for change and his Jewish heritage.

“I don’t think that one should need a Jewish heritage or any kind of religion to be in favor of justice equality, but I would say, for me personally, there is a very close tie [between] both the values that my religion teaches but also some of the [people] who have been prominent in Judaism over the centuries who have very loudly advocated for the cause of justice. That’s something I carry with me,” Bloom said, adding that “Jews can and should be advocating for justice not just within the Jewish community, but within the community at large.”

As organizations across the country reckon with the imprints of systemic racism, the Red Sox has not been immune. During a series in Boston two years ago, then-Baltimore Orioles outfielder Adam Jones reported hearing racist slurs directed at him as he manned Fenway’s center field. 

Earlier this month, retired outfielder Torii Hunter told ESPN Radio that he had been subjected to racist epithets “a hundred times” while playing at Fenway, revealing that this led the all-star to include the Red Sox in any no-trade clause.

The Red Sox later confirmed Hunter’s experience as “real,” promising to “identify how we can do better.” 

“There’s many things we can do better. I think that’s true for the Red Sox. It’s true for all of us,” Bloom added to JI.

“I think it’s too easy for us, especially those of us who are not affected by it personally on a daily basis because we are white, to forget that it is a pervasive problem in society,” he said. “We can’t forget that, and the only way to ensure that is to devise and take some concrete steps to combat it and to make sure that we’re being as positive and inclusive as we can in the circles where we have sway.”

***

The Rays and the Red Sox are examples of the two stratified spheres of baseball teams. Though both play in the American League’s East Division, the teams differ significantly in style and look. According to The Associated Press, the Red Sox opening-day payroll in 2019 was baseball’s highest, at just over $220 million, while the Rays payroll was the lowest, at just over $60 million. The Rays consistently struggle to fill seats in Tropicana Field, the enclosed, artificial turf stadium in St. Petersburg. Meanwhile, the Red Sox routinely sell out Fenway Park, the vintage, old-timey and unequivocally beautiful ballpark nestled into the surrounding Boston neighborhood that shares its name.

In a league without a salary cap, the difference between top and bottom paying teams is huge — even if it does not reflect as much in the standings. Whereas the Rays rely almost exclusively on a minor league farm system and savvy trades to procure new talent, the Red Sox have the added advantage of using their seemingly infinite resources to sign the league’s best stars.

Asked to describe the transition, Bloom gamely and diplomatically offers: “Every organization, every market is different. Everybody has their own strengths and new challenges.”

From left, Boston Red Sox owner John Henry, chairman Tom Werner, CEO Sam Kennedy and Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom hold a news conference at Fenway Park on January 15, 2020. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

Taking on the responsibility to run the Red Sox right now comes with a host of challenges.

During his four-year tenure, Dombrowski employed a strategy of welcoming expensive signings and prospect-draining trades. The upside was a World Series win. The downside, now playing out, is a depleted farm system, onerous contracts for aging or injury-riddled stars and an overall bloated payroll. Even after trading Betts, the roster is still stocked with young, homegrown talent quickly approaching the expiration of rookie contracts and free agency.

Now, the impending need to revive the farm system while managing future monetary demands of emerging talent like Jackie Bradley, Jr., Andrew Benintendi, and Rafael Devers places notable constraints on the team’s present and future return to World Series contention.

In the near-term, the more looming challenge remains the interruption caused by COVID-19, which prematurely shut down the start of spring training in March. “There’s no question that it is really hamstringing us and all 30 organizations,” Bloom explained. “One, we can’t be physically with our players….Two, we can’t have them experience the same type of feedback that they normally get through competition.”

The ripple effects will likely be felt for years to come. While the major league season is scheduled to begin in late July, the minor leagues will likely remain shuttered. This marks a potentially significant disruption for the all-important development of young players.

While the Red Sox tests programs for remote instruction, Bloom admits that the baseball world cannot easily predict the impact of the shutdown.

“It’s a unique challenge and an interesting one,” he told JI. “I think it has provided a lot of motivation for our staff during this layoff.”

Still, despite the challenges — including the loss of Betts — Bloom professes optimism for the upcoming season. He called last season’s 84 wins for the team “artificially low,” claiming that — despite losing Betts — the team remains “more talented than that.”

With the season shortened from 162 games to only 60, the unpredictability has everyone guessing. “I’m looking forward to watching this group compete because then I do get a chance to surprise people.”

Only time will tell if the prodigy can turn his optimism into success. Luckily, he keeps his gefilte fish jar close at hand in his office.

Bloom acknowledges that opinions differ over whether the initial fishy agreement covers only a Rays championship or whether the jurisdiction travels within the league. For now, he seems to leave those questions to the Judaic baseball scholars, adding simply “I’d love to win one here and figure that out then.”

In the meantime, the jar remains unopened in Bloom’s Fenway Park office, continuing to refine its delicate flavor.