As the July 31 MLB trade deadline looms large, all eyes are on Jed Hoyer and the Chicago Cubs.

Hoyer and his front office have just under six weeks to bolster a first-place Cubs roster aiming to secure a playoff berth for the first time since 2020 — and while the Cubs haven’t made any major moves yet, Hoyer’s former team just made a blockbuster trade that shook MLB.

[READ: Mark DeRosa wants Cubs to acquire starting pitching at trade deadline]

The Boston Red Sox struck a jaw-dropping deal on June 15, sending their franchise cornerstone Rafael Devers to the San Francisco Giants in exchange for big-league pitchers Jordan Hicks and Kyle Harrison, rookie affiliate pitcher Jose Bello and 2024 No. 13 draft pick James Tibbs III.

Seeing Boston’s haste had many wondering if more teams would follow suit. However, Hoyer called the deal “a one-off” in an interview with 670 The Score’s “Spiegel & Holmes Show” on June 17.

“I don’t think it jump-starts the market,” Hoyer said. “But as you start to get into this time of year, there are more conversations that happen. It just keeps ramping up and ramping up.”

The Cubs have already identified trade deadline needs — specifically starting pitching, with Justin Steele out for the season and fatigue hampering the current rotation. And while it’s unlikely that the Cubs will make a move quite as shocking as the Red Sox did, Hoyer has been part of a Boston blockbuster of his own.

At the 2004 trade deadline, he and then-general manager Theo Epstein orchestrated a four-team trade, with fan-favorite shortstop Nomar Garciaparra going to the Cubs as the centerpiece of the deal.

“I give Theo all the credit in the world,” Hoyer said. “That was such an unbelievably unpopular decision. I think I was pretty naive — we just felt like it was the right baseball decision.”

Much like Devers’ tenure and success in Boston, Garciaparra had spent his entire career with the Red Sox up until that point, winning Rookie of the Year in 1997 and earning five All-Star selections. But as popular as Garciaparra was with Boston fans, he had been nursing an Achilles injury that affected his defensive ability.

“Our defense was terrible, and we needed to improve (it),” Hoyer said. “In my naivete, that’s how I viewed it. We made the trade, and all of a sudden (came) the ramifications of ‘You just traded away this iconic player in Boston.’ Theo had to wear that.”

The Devers trade has faced similar backlash, with fans and media alike wondering why Red Sox chief baseball officer Craig Breslow would offload his club’s beloved three-time All-Star, who had been with the organization since he was a teenager.

“I know Bres felt incredible conviction that that was the right move to make them better,” Hoyer said. “He’s really competitive, he wants to win and I think he felt like this was the best avenue to that.”

At the time of the 2004 trade, the Red Sox were 11 games above .500 but still 7.5 games behind the first-place New York Yankees. The Cubs held the top Wild Card spot in the National League.

By mid-August, the Red Sox fell to a season-worst 10.5 games out of first place. But then, they lit up, going 33-12 over their final 45 regular-season games. On the other hand, the Cubs faltered, finishing third in the NL Central and missing the playoffs entirely despite winning 89 games.

The Garciaparra trade ended up paying off in the ultimate way for Epstein, Hoyer and the Red Sox when they won the 2004 World Series — their first title in 86 years.

“It took us two weeks to really start to play well,” Hoyer said. “The first two weeks of August, we still kind of muddled around. And then finally, we took off and never looked back.”