Cherington: Jays deal won't alter Sox plan

AMHERST -- Speaking at the Covering the Bases event -- a forum at the University of Massachusetts highlighting general managers Ben Cherington (Red Sox), Neil Huntington (Pirates) and Chris Antonetti (Indians) -- the topic  of the Blue Jays-Marlins' 12-player trade was broached.

"I wasn't expecting to see that tonight," Cherington said.

The Red Sox GM said that he heard about the deal just before taking the stage for the event, hearing about it by reading MLBTradeRumors.com.

"Not all the names involved," Cherington said when asked if the particulars of the deal was on his radar. "You talk to all the teams and you have a sense for some of the players, not necessarily those teams matching up. But all the names weren't surprising."

Cherington said that despite the deal -- which gave the Blue Jays Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle, Josh Johnson, Emilio Bonifacio and catcher John Buck -- the Red Sox won't alter their approach toward the offseason.

"We know we have a plan this offseason and we're going to see how much we can execute it," he said. "If that does happen it's not going to change what our plan is or our ability to execute it. We've started that and we'll continue to do that."

In the deal, Toronto surrendered Yunel Escobar, Adeiny Hechavarria, Henderson Alvarez, Jeff Mathis, Anthony DeSclafani and Justin Nicolino. For more on how the deal impacts the Sox and the AL East, click here [1]. 

In other Red Sox news, the team interviewed Victor Rodriguez for its hitting coach position Tuesday and plans on conducting interviews for the first base coaching job throughout the course of the week.

For more Red Sox news, go to the team page weei.com/redsox [2].