STL Cards: Bloom Admits Mixed Emotions about Flores Leaving for Astros

Seeing assistant general manager Randy Flores leave the St. Louis Cardinals for the GM job with the Houston Astros to accomplish a dream of having a front office to run on his own caused Chaim Bloom to feel all kinds of emotions over the past few days.

After all, Bloom – the Cardinals’ president of baseball operations – thought so highly of the talent evaluation and team-building skills of Flores that he kept him on staff even after taking over for the departed John Mozeliak in the fall of 2025. While Bloom was certainly happy with the promotion landed by Flores in Houston, it also saddened him because of the friendship the two had developed over the past three years while working together in St. Louis.

“It really is mixed feelings," Bloom told Tom Ackerman of KMOX in St. Louis on Sunday morning during his weekly radio segment. "On the one hand, we’re so happy for Flo. It’s an opportunity that is well-deserved and we’ve been very fortunate to have him and Houston is very fortunate to have him and they’re getting a good one. He is very well suited to lead people in this business, and really, he could do it in any business. It’s a big get for the Astros.

“At the same time, I loved working with the guy," Bloom continued. "Man, in the three years that we worked together here, I had really come to appreciate everything about him – not just the baseball executive, and he is a talented executive. But also, who he is as a teammate, how he leads people and who he is as a person, as a husband and as a dad – just top-shelf all around. We’re fortunate that he led our people so well that we won’t miss a beat, but you don’t just replace someone like Flo. We’re really sad to see him go and sad on a personal level because we will have fewer opportunities to catch up and joke around. But we wish him the very best in Houston.”

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Flores, a relief pitcher on the 2006 World Series champion Cardinals team, joined the club’s front office in 2015 and worked for St. Louis for the past 10 years – first as the director of scouting (2015-18) and later as assistant GM (2019-26).  

Flores is credited with drafting slugging outfielder Joshua Baez in 2021, standout rookie JJ Wetherholt in 2024 and top pitching prospects Liam Doyle and Tanner Franklin out of the University of Tennessee in 2025. His biggest draft coup was scoring current Cardinals’ standouts Jordan Walker (No. 21 pick), Masyn Winn (No. 54 pick) and Alec Burleson (No. 70 pick) in the transformational 2020 MLB Draft.

While Bloom joked that the Cardinals will likely have a hard time replacing Flores’ joking nature, he does think the organization is well-position to absorb the loss because of moves made last offseason to bolster the front office.

“This is something where we’ve already started to work through this and it is something that will start to take shape in the near future," Bloom said. "The good news is we’re as prepared for this as can be.

“One of the things we did last offseason was try to build out our capabilities and appoint directors in those spaces underneath (Flores)," Bloom added. "It was a tall task to ask (Flores) to lead both those areas (amateur and professional acquisitions) at the same time at the level of detail needed to be competitive in today’s game. We were afforded by ownership the chance to add department heads in both those spaces – one came from the outside with Joe Douglas joining us from Pittsburgh as the director of pro acquisitions and Zach Mortimer, who has been with us for years and was an internal promotion as amateur scouting director.

“Flo still steered the draft this past year at a high level and (last fall’s additions) just really beefed us up further. But we do still have department heads in both those areas, and they’re very capable of leading their groups.”