In a stunning early-season move, the Red Sox have announced a massive shakeup of their coaching staff. Manager Alex Cora has been fired, and many of his coaching staff have also been let go. That includes hitting coach Peter Fatse, assistant hitting coach Dillon Lawson, bench coach Ramón Vázquez, third base/outfield coach Kyle Hudson, and major league hitting strategist Joe Cronin.
Triple-A manager Chad Tracy will become the interim manager for the big-league club. Per the club’s announcement, Chad Epperson will serve as the interim third base coach, and Collin Hetzler will also join the major league hitting staff. Meanwhile, game planning and run prevention coach Jason Varitek is being reassigned to a different role.
Red Sox owner John Henry issued the following statement:
Alex Cora led this organization to one of the greatest seasons in Red Sox history in 2018, and for that, and the many years that followed, he will always have our deepest gratitude. He has had a lasting impact on this team and on this city. He has led on and off the field in so many important ways. These decisions are never easy, but this one is especially difficult given what Alex has meant to the Red Sox since the day he arrived.
I want to thank Alex, our coaches, and their families for everything they have given to this organization. They have been part of this club in a way that goes beyond the field, and they will always have our respect and gratitude.
The Red Sox are off to a brutal 10-17 start in 2026. They are currently in last place in the AL East. That kind of performance is well below expectations for a club that earned a Wild Card spot in last year’s playoffs and made several moves to upgrade the roster during the offseason. It is difficult to say how much of that blame is on Cora as the manager, but evidently, the club felt a massive shakeup was necessary to break out of their slump.
Cora has served as the team’s manager since 2018, save for a one-year absence in 2020 while serving a suspension for his role in the Astros’ 2017 sign-stealing scandal. He compiled a 620-541 (.534) record in his time leading the Red Sox. His first season was undoubtedly his best, as the team won 108 games and defeated the Dodgers in five games to claim their fourth World Series title of the century.
Since returning from his suspension, the club’s performance under Cora has been less consistent. A 92-win season in 2021 was followed by last-place finishes in 2022-23, a .500 season in 2024, and 89 wins in 2025. Nonetheless, he is regarded as one of the top managers in the game and widely respected by his players. The team signed him to a three-year, $21.75MM extension in July 2024, which covered the 2025-27 seasons. The $7.25MM annual salary made Cora one of the highest-paid managers in the game.
The extension was also notable because it followed a recent change in baseball operations leadership. Chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom was fired in September 2023. He was replaced by Craig Breslow. Given the change in top brass, it was fair to wonder if Cora would stay beyond 2024, the last year of his contract. The fact that Cora was extended through 2027 signaled confidence in his leadership and a desire for continuity under Breslow. In that context, Cora’s departure less than halfway through the extension is even more surprising.
In the end, the team’s performance this year may have simply been bad enough for club executives to want a change. Red Sox hitters have batted just .226/.306/.335 through their first 26 games, not including today’s blowout win. That amounts to a 78 wRC+, which ranks dead last in the Majors. Among their qualified hitters, Wilyer Abreu (130 wRC+) and trade acquisition Willson Contreras (115 wRC+) are the only ones performing at an above-average level. The other hitters range from below-average to downright dreadful.
It is still very early in the season, so small sample sizes need to be taken into account. However, the fact that the team’s offense is collectively struggling to this extent is more worrisome than if merely one or two players were underperforming. As with Cora as manager, it’s hard to say how much of that falls on the coaching staff, though it is noteworthy that most of the departing staff members are hitting coaches rather than pitching coaches.
On the pitching side, pitching coach Andrew Bailey and bullpen coach Chris Holt will remain in their roles. Red Sox pitchers have underperformed just like the hitters, though the club is undoubtedly banking on positive regression as the season goes on. Garrett Crochet is off to a rough start, including a 10 earned run shelling on April 13, but he is one of the top five starters in the game and will surely recover. The team signed Ranger Suarez to a five-year deal over the offseason, and he is due for positive regression as well.
Like the offense, the rotation has talented young players like Connelly Early, Brayan Bello, and Payton Tolle at its disposal. However, the club may have greater confidence in the pitching staff’s ability to rebound due to the track records of veterans Crochet, Suarez, and Sonny Gray (who is currently injured). The bullpen, which has a 3.73 ERA, similarly features veterans Aroldis Chapman and Garrett Whitlock. In contrast, most of the offensive struggles are from talented players with shorter track records, such as Caleb Durbin and Ceddanne Rafaela, as well as veterans who have struggled in recent years, like Trevor Story. Thus, the offense may have a greater need for new coaches, while the pitching staff (or at least the rotation) is more likely to recover on its own.
Time will tell if the managerial and coaching changes will bring about improved performance from the Red Sox. In order to match last season’s 89 wins, the club would need to play at 95-win pace the rest of the way. That is a significant challenge, of course, but perhaps not an insurmountable one with the young talent on the roster. As for Cora, he may look for a new managerial gig or even a role in a front office. He has expressed interest in front office roles before, including around the time of his July 2024 extension. Given his overall track record, he is a lock to find another role in baseball if he wants it.
Jeff Passan of ESPN was first to report the firings of Cora and Vázquez. He also reported the firing of Hudson. Julian McWilliams of CBS Sports was first to report on Fatse and Lawson’s firings, while Chris Cotillo of MassLive was first on Cronin. He also added that Bailey and Holt were staying in their roles. Gabrielle Starr of the Boston Herald was first on Tracy’s promotion, and Ari Alexander of 7News Boston clarified that Varitek was being reassigned rather than fired.
Photos courtesy of Peter Aiken and Dale Zanine, Imagn Images
Holy moly….
After the way Bello pitched yesterday, I was wondering if the players may have quit on Cora.
I think they did a while ago.
Suit- my thoughts exactly. Bello seemed to ignore him on the mound and the proceeded to continue getting bombed
Pretty sure Bello would’ve stopped the bleeding of he could. Like the manager or not he is still playing for his own well being.
Bello signed a 6 year/$55M contract. His well-being is secured.
I was watching. The mound visit by Cora in the fourth came across to me as a bit odd. He was doing a lot of speaking and there wasn’t much responding. It all seemed a bit off.
Bello said something to Cora to the effect of “vete a la mierda”. I don’t think there was much mutual respect there.
I did not expect this.
And I couldn’t be happier.
Cardinals Nation would be happy to see a veteran manager such as Alex Cora as the Cardinals Manager!!
Plus they’d love to pay the Air Fare for Oli Marmol to leave St. Louis and head to Boston!!!
I don’t think you can blame Cora for Bello getting rocked, he does that for the love of the game.
Is about time. Cora can be a strong manager for a veteran club, as we saw in 2021, but he has no idea how to manage this group. He leaned heavily on Bregman last year.
The season is lost, but hopefully the players can start to make progress again, as individuals and as a team.
I have a feeling that Cora lost the respect of the team a while back. I don’t think we ever found out what the issue was with Narvaez that led to him being benched. You wonder if he called Cora out for something. It shows you that management felt the coaching staff was more responsible than the players for the slow start. Now we will see if new coaching can turn things around. It is interesting that the Sox have one of if not the best offensive game of the season on the same day Cora is fired.
Uncle, yesterday’s ninth should be ignored given it was off a position player, still a nice win but don’t overstate what happened.
Dewey- Had not realized he was a position player. That would definitely make a big difference. Still interesting that they had done better offensively even before the ninth than recent games for Cora’s last.
The offense was never going to be great, but it should be a little steadier than it has been. Cora spent an awful lot of effort trying to make chopped liver into filet mignon, and the end result was worse than what he started with. Maybe Tracy can allow a mediocre lineup to be simply mediocre?
The starting pitching has been the real disaster this year.
Listening to TK and Bagwell (on Astros broadcast) talking about this yesterday, they said that there’s likely something wrong. When this many are fired, something is deeply wrong. Players must have a lot of complaints.
That’s fair, fans also have a lot of complaints, about the players, the manager, the GM, and especially ownership. The Chief Weasel, Sam Kennedy, is at the heart of the problems with the team. Too bad he can’t be fired.
It feels like the organization has been fighting itself for a few years now, perhaps ever since the Bogaerts departure. Maybe this can help get them back on the same page?
Players quitting on Cora is such a moronic statement. If anything he is a player manager. Players can just suck its a thing. Bello is as over rated to begin with. And probably why rumors of him on the block were true.
And yet Carlos Mendoza still has a job.
He’s next to go.
Hopefully. Mendoza is almost as bad as Cora.
Not for long. He is fired by mid season.
Joe Morgan is still alive! I wonder if he’d be up for another stint as Red Sox manager. He did great taking over the team in the middle of the season. I’ve never seen anyone play so many weird hunches and have them almost all work out! Lol.
Six, Two, and Even!
He’s 95.
Joe Kerrigan or we riot!
Morgan died at age 77.
RIP
Forever cheater
yup. Glad the a-hole is gone, even if there’s a real chance that benefits the team.
Yupp, look at those 2018 player stats. Everyone had a career year and has yet to replicate it; Betts, JD Martinez, Benintendi, etc.
Cora will forever be known as a cheater
Interesting.
People said the same about the Padres after the first 10 or so games and then things started going right.
Ding dong the cheating B*tch is dead
Yankee fan here.
This team was built pretty poorly. Their pitching and defense approach has been a disaster. This reeks of a bad GM throwing some blame around.
I like it, bc F*** the red sox, but this is a bad move to me. It’s April.
WOW!!!!
Raz – Wow indeed!!! Red Sox Nation has been waiting for this day since 2019!!!
Sucks to see Tek go, but he will land on his feet.
Fever, Tek isnt gone, he’s in a different role…
GaSox – Thanks, yeah I posted before Passan added that part. I do wonder if Tek accepted the new role already.
Fever,
You gotta be happy that Cora is gone now, but Red Sox are in a bad spot. Still early but whoever is the new manager has a tall task ahead of them. Honestly, I never thought they’d fire Cora considering how much ownership liked him.
Acoss – Ditto, I never imagined it happening this soon.
Would be hilarious if this is the first trade deadline where the Sox acquire at least one impact player ….. Cora hasn’t gotten real deadline help since Schwarber in 2021, and even then he was on the DL for a while.
Glad to hear Tek is still with the organization. I know he’d do fine but I don’t want to see him anywhere else. Probably true what mafia said that he’s too close to this mess to be made manager right now, even though he would be the first choice for most of us. Good luck to Chad Tracy, he’s got a big mess to clean up.
dirty – I just read a good article stating there’s been no discussion between management and Tek about the new role. He has no idea what the new role is, and won’t be told until “a later date”. There’s no guarantees he will accept it. He also took the news very, very hard.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s an empty position created just because they don’t want the optics of a franchise icon and fan favorite getting dumped by the franchise he’s been with for nearly 3 decades. If he doesn’t accept the position and he leaves, Sam Kennedy can say “If Jason Varitek wanted to be here, ultimately he’d be here.”
I wonder what that new role is. Glad he is still with the club.
Varitek is every part of this mess and should’ve been let go as well. Not re-assigned. He preaches the crazy analytics now. The team whiffs a ton. Most of the offense is hitting under .230. The team batting average is .233. The youth isn’t as good as advertised. I’ve been skeptical of them for a while. Varitek was a game-planning coordinator. Whatever he was doing was not working out. The numbers are awful.
The pitching is atrocious as well. That’s another issue. Andrew Bailey deserves the blame there. Ridiculous to retain him and dump everyone else.
But giving Varitek this free pass because he is a fan-favorite and has been with the organization for almost 30 years is a bad look.
The Red Sox need to fix everything from top to bottom.
Ultimately, until John Henry starts to care again, nothing will change. This is just shuffling a deck of cards. The team will be in the same place in 2027.
Who cares about optics. In fact, optics have been garbage for this franchise for a while.
This is 2026. Not 2004. Varitek wasn’t doing anything special in a role the team created to keep him in the organization.
Just because someone played well for a team, it doesn’t give them a free pass to stay.
If Tom Brady was coaching the Patriots and stunk up the joint, I’d call him out as well.
With the exception of the Celtics, all the Boston teams are or were coached by fan favorites this year. It isn’t a free pass if they are bad at their job.
Well, if they’re in a better spot, you ought to be glad. Right?
Sell – Optics are very important to every team, you want to keep your longtime stars in the fold after retirement. Why do you think Ortiz, Rice, Pap etc are still employees under the Red Sox umbrella and guys like Pedro are still part of the franchise as “Special Assistant”.
GaSox – Per Cotillo, Tek declined the new position.
Like I said elsewhere, him not being named interim manager means his desire to manage will have to come with another team.
It was probably an insulting optics-only reassignment offer so Kennedy can say “If Jason Varitek wanted to be here, ultimately he would be here.”
I’m still hoping for David Ross coming aboard during the offseason.
Red Sox ownership are cheap, cheap, cheap. they liked him as long as they could because they owe him for this year and next. they only gave him the heave ho because they players said “no mas”
I saw somewhere that he’s being reassigned instead of let go. I don’t want to see Tek in another uniform. Honestly, I want him to be the manager, but he’s probably too close to all this. Plus just because I want it doesn’t mean he does.
Why would Varitek make a good manager? Because he called a good game as a catcher? He couldn’t even do his job as a game planning coordinator or whatever it is called. Good riddance if he moves on.
Sell- We don’t know how much say Varitek actually had and if anything he was doing was a significant factor. It could be that Cora was a control freak and made most of the decisions, leaving Varitek waiting to get an opportunity. I think if he did have a major impact in the season being so bad he would be gone as well. Maybe we will start hearing things from the players. I don’t think he was kept just for optics. We also don’t know how he will be used with this changed role.
Same goes for Bailey. I don’t know how much of the issues with the pitchers was tied to the work he has done with them or was it tied to the quality/health of the staff along with how Cora used them. I agree that the pitching has not been impressive and was surprised they kept Bailey. They obviously felt he has the potential to help turn things around.
We should get a better feel now that Cora is gone.
Fever- I did not see this coming. Was this done before or after their big win yesterday? I did not see the game just the box score. It was obvious that they needed a change. Things were different this year and I think Cora had run his course and was losing the team. Once you lose the players it gets pretty hopeless.
Uncle – After, The Holy Trio was waiting for Cora and the coaches in the team hotel after the game.
Did you see the tweet from Cora last night? He knows he won’t be out of work for very long, he will probably return in 2028 with some other team.
FPG
Breslow keeping his guy Bailey . I want to see him keep working with Tolle and Early. Whatever they are applying to them is working. Now Bello needs a new voice or strategy to get the most out of him. The development in the minors ( pitching) seems to be at a all-time high.
Crazy thought… If Story, Mayer, Durbin ,ect. continue to struggle and he continues to excel at newly reached AA, can 20 years old Arias make the jump to the Sox???
cdc – hi!
You’re about the 80th person to suggest Arias.
I’m against it, we all saw what happened with KC. And Arias has spent far less time in the minors than KC had. I don’t want Arias getting ruined, especially with such a chaotic environment right now. Press conference is going on now.
Breslow must be feeling breath on the back of his neck.
Breslow now gets to pick his own manager and staff instead of being stuck with Cora and his buddies.
Skip, thats the biggest asterisk that has bothered me about all the Chaim and Breslow hate — neither were allowed to implement their own coaching staff that better align with their visions and roster construction.
If this team somehow turns it around now, and if Breslow makes a few impactful additions, then that goes a long way to say how much Cora was negatively impacting the output.
Cora was fired. Chaim at least officially, went through the motions of interviews and chose to hire Cora.
Breslow, however, you are correct didnt have that luxury, till now.
GA we both know that the Mookie trade and Cora re-hiring came from above
Mike – That’s probably just his wife standing over him, telling him to get off the damn computer.
That doesn’t change nothing.
That doesn’t change *anything.
are you the Grammer cops or do you agree?
*grammar
Kelsey Grammar
Tossed salads and scrambled eggs
they’re callin’ again!
Well we kind of need him to improve his grammar so we can even know if we agree or not. It’s not like it’s a simple typo, the double negative is saying the exact opposite of what he probably means.
Goodnight Boston!
Yes there are grandma cops here.
So it changes everything, you mean?
or, it must at least change something.
dawg – We are hoping they ended the contract with Driveline too. That would be a huge change.
That would be monumental.
Eliminate that and you’ll see improvement. Sadly, Varitek preached their ideals.
Sell – I don’t fault Tek for that, he’s just doing what he was told to do.
Similar to Breslow doing what Henry told him to do.
Whenever you have a boss, if you want to keep your job you have to do what they say.
It changes EVERYTHING!
It might. We can see that the team is underperforming, and that players tend to get better when they leave Boston. Why? It isn’t all because we’re a relentless fan base.
So what does it change?
Something at least. Cora once Phillies maybe? I doubt Thomson’s seat is that hot. but DD and Cora are buds, according to Smoltz.
padd – The irony of it, Cora forced Dombrowski out the door by tanking the 2019 season.
But who knows, crazier things have happened. Cora has also expressed strong interest in eventually going into a front office job.
Correct batting orders, stopping useless platooning, correct bullpen rotation
Managers dont won a lot of games, but boy, they sure can lose them
Sad – Well said.
It’s like umpires, if they do their job then nobody talks about them.
FPG- I guess Breslow didnt like that Cora said midweek that he was in on all the Offseason moves LOL
Bres wants all the credit for that mess to himself
Sad – Could be.
Also yesterday in an interview he was asked if he felt his job was safe. In a cocky manner, he replied by saying he’s not worried at all. He said his biggest worry was helping his family pack for PR.
That had to rub Henry the wrong way.
Henry just wanted to make sure he had all the time he needed to help them pack.
You want to see some asinine lineups look no further than Kotsay with my A’s. It’s literally so.e of the worst I’ve ever seen and I’ve been watching baseball my entire life.
It doesn’t change nothing, it changes everything.
They say it can change nothing into everything. But in my experience it’s far simpler to change everything into nothing, i.e. Shiva the Destroyer.
Where are fpg and the rest of the cora haters…maybe at the bar celebrating?
FPG is gonna be a Cora apologist now since Breslow fired him
Chief Baseball Officer = bad
Anyone who goes against the CBO = good
I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if thousands of voices suddenly cried out in joy and were suddenly dancing in the streets…
Since the players had all quit on Cora anyway, what’s to be upset about?
John Henry decided to nuke the dugout staff coming off that Yankee sweep at Fenway in midweek. It didn’t matter that the BoSox thumped the O’s in Baltimore this afternoon.
The players didn’t quit on Cora, the players just suck in general. You’re implying Cora has something to do with their poor metrics, but what if they just suck? I find it hard to believe they are playing badly just to stick it to Cora.
I can only speak for myself but I can imagine I’m not the only one who chooses to not spend their entire Saturday parked in front of the computer. I’m very pleased with the news though, thanks for asking! Really did not see this coming at all which makes it an even sweeter surprise. Now I just hope John doesn’t meddle with the hiring process. Let Breslow find his own staff, for better or worse. He made a good pick at pitching coach with Bailey. Even if the general consensus is that he isn’t great at the job, you still have to give the guy a fair chance to actually do his job.
Are you implying there is something wrong with being parked in front of a computer on a Saturday ??
Yep! Shots all around. And again when that cheating pos never gets another mlb job.
My message to John Henry: Hire rising indie rockstar Cameron Winter to be the next manager!
Were you in a Boston baaaaar as you were writing that? I’m sure after a few brews he’ll take it under advisement
NO
Why you do this 27 games in is beyond me. Clearing house this early throws in the towel on the season. Absurd
Not necessarily… none of the coaches are playing, they have very minimal impact on the outcome of any game. Players win and lose baseball games, not coaches.
Managers certainly have an impact.
Hank – no one has ever figured out an accepted way to quantify a MLB manager’s impact on the team. It is unknown whether they truly do or do not have an impact, and if there is an impact, to what extent is it the manager versus the players. I think it’s entirely the players.
Take a quick look at the Brewers and see what they did last year with the players they had. Managers have a lot to do with the success (or failure, Mr. Cora) of a team.
I’ve never seen any reason to think baseball coaching has that much impact. They’re about keeping the ship steered in the right direction, not guys whose departure leaves an impossible hole.
Actually, making a change this early leaves time to save the season.
Coaches are just the scapegoats for a teams bad performance usually
They got sick of seeing the same lack of preparation to start seasons, sick of hearing the same ‘we just have to do better’ while not making any changes, amd, not taking any accountability.
You do this exactly after seeing yet another season going down the tubes the way it has so many times in the recent past. Why watch the re-run to its conclusion?
No, it does the opposite. People need to quit pretending there’s no human element to baseball. Can it really get much worse?? This should be a breath of fresh air.
It worked for the Marlins in 2003.
deal – It’s been known to spark the team.
More importantly, Tracy did a pretty good job managing most of the players in Woosta. It makes sense. As much as I like Tek, he was probably too close to Cora.
Cotillo is saying Tek has been reassigned not fired
Yeah Red Sox official statement is Tek has been reassigned.
Correct fever !! Buffalo Sabres prime example.
Brought in a new coach at the beginning of the season but still struggled.
Fired the GM and brought in someone else and went on immediate tear to first place in the Atlantic. Incredible.
Gary – I don’t follow the NHL that much, but how would Buffalo firing the GM midseason immediately help? Did the new GM make some great moves before the trade deadline?
I’m actually a Sabres fan and I don’t quite understand how it happened. Everything just started clicking. I don’t have another answer than that.
But your point is correct. Make a change in management and it can definitely spark things. Go Sabres !
Gary – I’m not a Bruins fan, so all good ;O)
So who is your football team? It’s the only sport left. LOL
No time for football. Never was attracted to the game.
Sabres fan since 1975 fog finals and my dad complaining that the Flyers were such bullies. We went for the underdogs and been a Sabres fan ever since.
Gary – Well yeah, that’s why the Flyers were called the Broad Street Bullies ;O)
Girardi was let go pretty early in the season with the phillies then they went on a tear and got into the world series i believe that same season or was it just high in the playoffs.
Fly – Yes Girardi was fired June 3rd, and the team went to the WS that same year.
Because Cora’s approach has been completely failing the young core. Whether this team can still be a playoff team like we thought is irrelevant to the timing, the top priority for the Red Sox is making sure they hit on this wave of prospects and Cora’s leadership does not have them on a good footing right now.
Randomly benching Roman here and there. Treating Mayer like a platoon player when he’s at a stage in his development where he needs to play every day and given the trust to try and work through issues. Having Duran swing for the downs every AB which has just resulted in him flailing the bat around helplessly instead of being the XBH machine he used to be. Campbell being stuck in AAA purgatory. Constantly bringing in Weissert to implode in close games. Not reining in all the insanely bad ABS challenges. The infield defense STILL being atrocious despite Mayer and Durbin having good reputations in that department and IKF being a literal Gold Glove defensive specialist. Bello seems to have completely tuned him out and has just been getting shelled this year.
Every additional day spent with these coaches is additional negative development for the younger guys. I’m glad to see they moved with the proper sense of urgency, it was completely unexpected. Maybe the old John Henry is still in there after all!
The towel was already there covering it all up. They are changing the look of the towel. I hate to see nearly everyone lose their job. I would suspect a couple of them were probably fine and possibly beneficial but got caught up in this.
I will not miss Cora one bit. The position and lineup jumbling all the time is a nightmare for players for preparation. I am a huge believer in fine-tuning players at whatever position they have the most beneficial impact to a team and not making them mediocre Swiss pocketknives. Sometimes that involves moving a player’s position, but in that case, you have to commit early in the off season to allow them the maximum time to prepare and acclimate, and most importantly stick to it so they get maximum reps there.
He placed so much value on versatility. There is something to be said for the old days when a player was a solid hitter and was so good at fielding their position that you would pencil them in everyday to play their position and hire another guy with an amazing glove to give people a rest once in a blue moon.
Bullpen usage and construction was always a sticking point with me.
william – Now for the first time in 5 years we will truly find out what decisions Cora was behind, and what decisions the front office was behind.
I’ll be paying close attention. Some think Cora was merely doing what the front office was telling him to do, such as lineups and bullpen usage. Whatever changes from here on out, we will know it wasn’t the front office that was making the decision under Cora.
Fever, you imply we can trust anything Cora says about his tenure. He’s a blame shifting snake. Sort of how i discount most of what Kennedy says, except Cora is worse.
GaSox – My bad, I didn’t word my post very well.
I meant by seeing changes with managerial decisions, not what Cora has to say. I stopped believing what Cora says about 5 years ago.
First thing I will look at is today’s lineup, let’s see where Duran/Rafaela/Contreras/Roman are.
I agree. If things remain mostly the same, we will know that the decision making was coming mostly from the very top. If we see some fundamental past approaches quickly change for better or worse we will see that they were field level choices.
There is so little leeway with offensive pieces for the interim manager.
william – Well whatta ya know, top of today’s lineup is EXACTLY what I’ve been pushing for all season.
Duran – the ultimate leadoff guy, get him back to 2024
Contreras – high OBP guy
Roman – s/b the team’s best hitter
Abreu – best power guy
Story sitting because of what he said?
The stat crunchers running baseball think that your best hitter leading off is great because of the extra at-bats over a full year, and that they really only lead off once. I like the guys that do damage having an optimal chance to do damage with people on base when they do that damage. Different philosophy.
I like speed with OBP leading off and being on base to get pitchers off their game right away, open up the holes for the lefty hitters, and allow your better hitters to drive in a run with a hit from second, and with an extra base hit from first.
william – I keep hearing the stat cruncher excuse of “more PA’s” and every time I do, it drives me up a freakin’ wall.
There was an old article by Bill James that proved the few extra PA’s between leadoff and #3 was not worth the many additional RBI opportunities from the 3-hole, I referenced it all the time …. haven’t been able to find it recently, may have been taken down.
It’s asinine to have your best homerun hitter stepping to the plate with nobody on base every game during the first inning. And with the #8 and #9 hitters batting directly in front of you, obviously not many RBI opportunities.
You do it this early to salvage the season.
Rob Thomson will probably be next….
Topper will be fired on the Phillies off day Monday.
Carlos Mendoza will probably join him before by midweek. They can all hang out together.
I hope you are right. I’d like to see Cora replace Thompson.
Now do Mendy.
Espada next!!
Who is left to be interim manager? Bailey?
Chad Tracy is coming up from Worcester
Very interesting “call up from the minors”
AAA depth is always important.
Didn’t see this coming at this time. That said, not at all sorry to see him go.
Getting rid of Devers and not keeping bregman and being cheap is sure Coras fault
Being cheap started long before devers
Devers might have been. We’re not privy to how that went down, but it sure looked like Cora lied to him
They mishandled Devers for years, and knew his fielding was trash. He’s an excellent hitter and if they’d gotten him work as a 1B from the beginning of his career all of that would’ve been avoided.
No argument here. Things are looking up a bit defensively. I wonder if Story is going to get moved to second… if Cora was resisting that perhaps? Honestly, I never got signing Story for six years in the first place with Mayer in the wings.
I have to think that Story is moving of SS
I don’t watch the games, I listen. The Wills are talking almost every night about how his arm isn’t the same. I don’t have anything against Story, but it’s time for Mayer.
Ever since his elbow surgery he needed to move off short.
Story’s offensive glory has been mostly garnered in Colorados altitude, he’s been an average player down to earth.
He’s no superstar. His lack of leadership is daunting on this club.
He has a career 30%+ strikeout rate that’s atrocious and should only be tolerated if your clubbing 50+ homers.
Breslow owns the lack performance of this team.
Cora is the scapegoat.
Leadership by players is highly overrated in baseball.
Even if it wasn’t an overrated thing, the “team leader” is usually a washed up 35+ years old bench bat still barely clinging to a roster spot.
I’ve stayed out of commenting until now. Story does lead by example. He has worked well with the young players and should’ve gotten more credit last year. He’s as much of a leader to them as Bregman was in my view.
He WAS an excellent hitter. Not much evidence of still being that way over the last 2 years.
He had a 126 wRC+ last year after the trade. That’s excellent. This year’s still a small enough sample size.
Giant fan here. Devers was ok last year after trade…this year horrible, can’t hit a fastball. He is not an ‘excellent hitter’ these days…
They got rid of Devers on June 15 when they were one game over .500. They finished the season 16 games over and made the playoffs. So not clear trading Devers was a problem. But if it was, Cora bears a lot of responsibility for it because he totally mismanaged th Devers/Bregman situation.
Banning Apple Watches hurt Cora (probably, allegedly).
The the baseball is dead guys call this?
Did the baseball is dead guys call this?
Wow, it’s really their fault? Breslow totally set this franchise back years
It isn’t any of the coaches faults, none of them are throwing pitches or batting or fielding or running… they are just the scapegoats for poor team construction and the trickle-down affect of many poor decisions over recent years. Probably too early to make an overall assessment of the roster build… could easily just be variance… I’d say this is how a poorly run franchise operates.
Luke- have you seen the lineups or the bullpen rotation Cora has used so far this season? Hes certainly responsible for some of the poor play
Is he though? Or are his players not performing to expectation? When a manager puts a reliever in, they can only hope the reliever gets outs. Every relief pitcher in baseball is capable of throwing a 1-2-3 inning in any given outing. But, no one has a 0 ERA because pitchers get hit periodically. So, claiming it’s his fault for bringing in a reliever who gets hit in that appearance… how is that his fault? If the guy is on the roster, it’s presumed he is there because he is worthy enough of that spot, therefore. he has to play to some extent. And, as far as a line up goes, that makes far more of a difference over the course of 162 games than any individual game, and that difference is nearly invisible to a spectator and can only be realized in the stats over a large sample size. Even if he put his best 3 hitters 7-8-9, they can still win any given game, but if he did that every game, they’d score fewer runs per game on average and that would surely impact them over the course of the season. But, he wasn’t doing that.
Luke… Tell me you don’t know baseball without telling me you don’t know baseball
No, tell me… what did I write that jumped you to such a conclusion? I just reread what I wrote, I’m failing to see where you’d draw such a conclusion.
A couple of points. When you see such abysmal situational hitting on top of the poor performance that is 100% the manager. The players are either not aware of the situation and what the goal is (managers fault), don’t care about the situation (managers job to make them care or sit), or they simply cannot execute (managers job to find a major league hitter that knows, cares, and can execute situational hitting).
On the pitching side it is not about Cora not executing pitches on behalf of the pitchers, but the organizational approach, which he does have control of.
I can usually predict pitches and location during games for our pitchers before the sign goes down. I am not some genius pitching savant. I am just observant. I know most times what is coming and where because there is an organizational approach that is consistent and has become predictable. It is almost universal for all the pitchers despite their individual differences.
I don’t get paid to observe that, but every team in the league has people paid to pick up on that stuff, and if I can, you can bet the bank they can. Bello, with all his stuff, looks like he is giving hand signals to the catcher for what pitch is coming. He is that predictable to hit off of.
Luke, you obviously don’t have much of an understanding of what a coach’s job actually is.
Talking out your behind.
You proved you don’t know what a coach’s job is with your comment. Its not something that is in question. When called out on it, you try to spin with a childish take of “talking out your behind”.
No, it’s true, you just don’t see it yet. But, since you challenged, let’s talk it out. What MLB coaching experience do you have? None, right… so, what do you know about it? As much as I do. Except, I don’t make foolish claims, like yours alluding to you having an understanding of a manager’s or coach’s job at the MLB level. What I wrote that caused you to lash out to begin with… what, exactly, did I write that jumped you to such a conclusion about my lack of MLB coaching knowledge?
Luke, it seems like you never played any organized sports to not know the impact a coach has on a team, let alone a professional one.
Cora should have been banned from baseball years ago, so this makes me happy.
Get over it. Move on.
No. There was no meaningful accountability for 2017, so it’s hanging around. Take down the flag, remove Beltran from the Hall, and permanently ban Hinch, Cora, Beltran, and maybe a few others and we’ll let it go.
Beltran was voted into the Hall of Fame in spite of everything being brought to light.
Also, you sound like a Dodgers fan. You’re welcome for Mookie, now kindly stow it 🙂
Nah. Just mute the whiners.
cheap – The fact Cora got only a 60-game penalty, during a joke of a season, is a travesty. It equates to 2 months, that’s it.
@ cheapseater None of those things are going to happen so get over it.
Why? Why would someone “move on”?
Did the facts change or should everyone just forget that the guy led a team to steal a WS?
Why would you hold onto that anger or hate? It’s burdensome. The results of that World Series are never going to be changed. It is accepted fact that Houston won. MLB is never changing that, nor will there ever be any future punishments coming to anyone involved. And, what loss did you suffer personally as a result of it? And still hanging onto it all these years later? For what? Whatever you think it was that made you feel this way, it doesn’t matter. Therefore, PhantomStrike is correct: you should move on from it.
Who says I have anger or hate?
I think him, and everyone else on that team, should have been held accountable. I think they should have been banned for life honestly.
Dude, just because I don’t think that things that people do should be forgotten and forgiven with zero consequences doesn’t mean I have anger or hate. It mean I live in adult world.
Cheating, and especially to win a WS, shouldn’t be let go like nothing happened. It was wrong then. It’s wrong now.
“Let it go” is how it happens all over again. No consequences leads to more of that behavior. It’s rather simple.
Yeah, it all worked out in the end. 3 chips including back-2-back, Stros back to being irrelevant, and a jobless Cora. Yay 🥳
No he shouldn’t have, and he’ll have another managerial gig before you know it.
That’ll be great for team morale
The front office F@#*ed up this team.
The only way to send a message to the management is to stay home.
I bet Cora is relieved to leave this dysfunctional organization.
Cora just said that he was a part of every offseason move. So you are saying Cora f’d up this team?
No, I am not.
Cora is a part of management; hence he would be in on every move made. It does not mean he agreed with the moves or authorized them.
Moving Devers was John Henry, not signing Bregman was Breslow’s colossal blunder.
Cora said that he agreed with the moves and was part of the decision making. That none of the moves were made without his agreeing to them. He said he did exactly what you are saying he didn’t do. So you are saying Cora lied? That I can believe.
Moving Devers was necessary and it was Breslow’s call. Henry, Kennedy, and Breslow all talked about that. That may be Henry setting up Breslow as a scapegoat if the decision went wrong and obviously a move of that scale would have to be discussed with ownership, but Devers was a cancer, and expensive cancer, that needed to be excised. It was a good move for the team both short term and long term.
If not signing Bregman was a mistake, it was one made above Breslow’s head. Henry is the one that says how much money can be spent, not Breslow.
Not overpaying Bregman was smart.
I’m thinking Joe Maddon is getting the gig. It he doesn’t know it yet. His phone is off. Him and the wife are watching the Michael Jackson movie… Tito get me a tissue
If he was really seeing the Michael movie, that poor of judgement should disqualify him
I mean its not what I was expecting to hear after the sox literally slaughtered my O’s today.
Sox couldn’t even follow business protocol by firing a guy on a Friday afternoon so he can be free for the whole weekend.
Meaning, with this massive win today, they already decided to do it, but waited until today for some reason lol ?
Maybe because Henry was busy on the golf course yesterday and didn’t have time to prepare or make a statement publicly ?
Definitely goes down as one of the more weird firings timing wise for sure lol
GASoxfan made a good point elsewhere. Today’s start time probably had a lot to do with it.
scruff – It’s only fitting, considering Cora got his 3-year extension on the day they lost 20-7 in Colorado.
Gary- considering they moved today’s game up to noon from 4pm they probably didnt have time prior to today’s game to get Tracy to Baltimore
Yes, exactly Sad sox
They fired him on the road. It said “We don’t even want to see you walk back into our clubhouse. Peace. Out!”
Cora got the axe before Thompson or Mendoza? Wow.
Fatse the hitting coach getting fired is probably the best news of the whole thing. The hitting approach needs to change.
I wonder if it was the we have a bunch of kids and we’re still learning comment that he made that finally broke the camels back?
BOOM…..Shots fired!!! Wow!!!!
Bres the stiff better hope this works or he’s next in a couple of months!
Finally. I hate the Red Sox, but I hate Cora even more. He doesn’t deserve to coach. This was A LONG TIME coming. Should’ve stayed fired after he got caught and fired in 2019.
Keep crying.
lol a thousand identical replies to this article and you single me out? Why?
I saw yours second I think. Then saw so many more it would take me all night to reply to them all lol.
Don’t you have some angry rants to make in your lifted S10 about how the world is changing and how much that frightens you?
Finally got what he deserves. Cheater from Houston days. Good riddancd
He hasn’t really done anything since 2021 so I guess I can see the move
Red Sox have been spinning their wheels since the Mookie trade.
Was waiting a long time for this
He was nothing but a cheat to me
Seeing as he has previous ties to both the Red Sox org as a player and with Craig Breslow when he was with the Cubs in the FO, I wonder if David Ross is a candidate to be their next manager here.
That’s the name I’m expecting to see get some play. But I don’t know if that will happen during the season, since they’ve announced that Chad Tracy will be the interim, bringing him up from the manager job in Worcester. Plus they might want a larger candidate field after the usual 8 or 10 firings once this season is over!
Yes. Exactly. Breslow will absolutely want to pick from an assortment of manager candidates that got fired for not doing their job well with another team.
Managers who are fired from one team often get the same job with another team. It’s a matter of matching voices and philosophies to a group of players and to a front office disposition. The “change of scenery” thing, but in this case for a manager, not a player. Also, there are undoubtedly some candidates who would prefer an interview and hire once the season is over–start with a clean slate, as it were. I left that part out, but that should be obvious. So, yes, 8 or 10 firings is likely to create a larger candidate field, and not just because 8 or 10 ex-managers are looking for new jobs.
Definitely a strong connection there. The guy I’d really like to see though is Mike Lowell.
There it is.
Sorry to see Tek go, but this needed to happen
Tek’s being reassigned within the organization.
shoulda been fired immediately after the astros scandal became public!
AND
sox f’ed up ROYALLY when they traded away devers
Because Devers is hitting so well?
Devers has an OPS of .565 and has struck out in 32% of his ABs.
he was a superstar with redsox. 1 of the most feared hitters for a decade.
SF has turned him into a pedestrian.
hope boston’s happy!
incompetent leadership did this.
his career is over. and they’re in last place in the al east
Devers and his negative WAR and 62 OPS+?
SF is rumored to be seeing him as more a permanent DH and coming back off 1B going forward on his deal
If they move him off 1B his WAR will sink further.
Who cares about WAR? No defense is better than bad defense
The inside scoop osnthey think he’d do better focused only on hitting preparation, and, not spending as much time on defensive stuff
Its not lack of focus
Jesus
Do any of u actually follow baseball or spend all day looking at WAR and OPS+ and abcxyz?
Since barry bonds (before most of you were probly born) SF has produced the following players with MORE than 30hr in 1 season:
Mike Keenan available? Alive?
If you’re going that far back, maybe just Scotty Bowman
As a Hawks fan I can say without hesitation stay away from anyone in the Bowman family.
Toe Blake?
Eddie Shore!
maybe go in a different direction and bring Belichick back to Boston
Should have banged some trash cans so Cora would know it was coming.
ITS ABOUT TIME!!!!!!!
After 27 games they are already panicking. Good grief!
Good ‘ol’ Charlie Brown
As they should be !!
And it’s not 27 games.., it’s been 5/6 years.
There is a God
Look at me I’m your manager now
They should Hire Brandon Hyde…. but if not, David Ross .
Last night I dreamnt the angels traded for Luis Castillo of Seattle.
H E double hockey sticks YES!
Oh wow. That’s all I have to say about this.
Freaking cheater. Good riddance
Not sure this was the smartest move letting all the coaches go. Especially this early in the year, and it makes you wonder who will be at the helm as an interim manager. Tec might have possibly turned the job down so he was prolly moved on. A lot of holes to fill. I guess we will find out!
They’re bringing up the Triple-A manager at Worcester to be interim. Varitek wasn’t about to become skipper with this housecleaning.
Veritek was part of the housecleaning.
They’re bringing up the Triple A manager to manage a Triple A Team
That’s wild lmao
Cora should have gone a while ago. That 2018 team was an absolute unit to say the least and I don’t think Cora played much role in that championship. He certainly didn’t have any convincing success afterwards
Kinda sad Varitek doesn’t get a chance to take the manager reigns
Yeah I felt Varitek ended up being collateral damage to be honest, out of the group he probably deserved better than what he got.
I’m bummed about Tek, and stunned about Cora. So much for that front office job that never made sense to me.
This also makes me wonder what he actually said on the mound to Bello last night.
Cora could have been fired before but in Family Feud he wasn’t the to answer on the board. John Henry can’t fire himself for what he did a complete 360 as an owner after 2018. Alonso signed for a solid deal and they didn’t get involved. They didn’t get involved in Cease. When they didn’t make a serious attempt at Ohtani I knew something was wrong. They use to want to dominate the Japanese market and did well when they had Dice-K. Even though he was a one season wonder they made a ton of money grabbing the biggest star from Japan at the time in the Japanese market.
This ownership is reaping what they have sewn. They have gone from trying to be a consistent winner and raising revenues anywhere to building an entertainment company and putting the franchises they own second.
Truth. Fenway Park is a tourist attraction. As long as fannies are in the seats, Henry is happy.
At last! Now for Rob Thomson and Carlos Mendoza to do the same.
Hallelujah.
This going to spawn countless new user names and name changes.
Guy was so bad even being a cheater couldn’t help him win 🤣
Cora is a big effing cheater
That’s one way to celebrate scoring 17 runs!
This is absolutely a case of.., fire the field manager before I get fired lol
The desperate last attempt of a condemned man.
Henry should fire himself.
Yep. Called it.
Where are all you “Jason Veritek is amazing and will be the next Red Sox manager” folks ??
Didn’t you argue with me last year that he was the heir apparent and an automatic hire because you didn’t want to lose him to some other team?
Well, here’s mud in your eye you were wrong for lambasting me over questioning something that was yet to be decided. To you though, it was a foregone conclusion.
Tek not only didn’t get hired, but he actually got fired today !!
Gary – cite to Tek being fired?
Everything i see says he’s moved to a new position. Arguably could be a promotion.
Its possible Tek didn’t want to take over mid season, with no time to develop his own coaching staff
Seeing reports that Varitek was reassigned.
Reassigned for preparing how to deal with Breslow’s communications skills, or lack therof.
Well he was “in charge” of game planning and run prevention. Yeah right. But I think he actually just caught a stray by being part of the Cora group.
👎
👍🏻
I was waiting for them to DFA or option Bello and fire Cora. Someone told me Henry would never fire Cora and would promote him to front office. Glad they were wrong.
Bello isn’t getting DFA’d because they owe him a lot of money. He’s got one or two more starts to right himself before it’s the bullpen or Worcester for him. Tolle is here to stay.
Or IL and rehab stint
I really wonder how much of that is manipulated. It can’t be the case that every pitcher that goes out there and sucks is the worthy of the IL.
Maflabass…. Bello problem is in his head, and the reason stems back to Cora not having faith in him and pulling him after 28 pitches in game 2 of the Yankees playoff series…. again, as a player who would trust a Manager that doesn’t have faith in him. I said then, that Bello was going to be problem this year because of that situation.
So if the players “gave up” on Cora then what is going to be their motivation as a 10-17 team to run through a wall for the AAA manager?
Cora is a self serving blow hard, who thinks hes smarter than the game.
If Tracy makes Anthony and Mayer comfortable, plays and bats them correctly, moves Story off shortstop and overall isn’t Alex Cora its an improvement
Mayer needs to play everyday. Duran needs to lead off everyday, Anthony should bat third. If I had to guess, thats what we’ll see
A lot of these guys sent time playing for that manager, and, did well under him.
When I think of all the young and homegrown players, I expect they relate to and play harder for the AAA boss than Cora.
The big ‘losers’ here are coral favorites who get more playing time than they deserve via performance. His ‘favkrites’ are probably a little worried tonight, as they should’ve been a long time agi
GASoxFan- agreed.
Hopefully this is all about Anthony. Hes gotta move out of leadoff and play everyday in the field
Another excellent point GASox fan !! (regarding a lot of these guys played for this AAA manager, and are thus comfortable with him. Great move bringing him up to Fenway with all the young guys playing right now.)
The GM should join them
I remember Alex was a highly respected field manager, back in the days before he played a lead role in the character assassination attempt of a homegrown hero.
Usually, in Boston, they’re all about getting rid of that ‘Prima Donna’ in favor of someone ‘gritty’.
Times change I guess
Big Papi is about to put on the manager jersey.
Lol !!!!!!!
Manny for bench coach!
Scoreboard operator. He knows where the door is.
Breslow runs Devers, out of town (not his signing) then his, replacement leaves after one year and he puts the load on Contreras. Red Sox lost their way before Breslow but he should have been fired before Cora.
It all starts with ownership. Cora is the scapegoat here.
Bingo!!! We got Bingo!!!
Scapegoat? No way…. it’s about his inability to develop the young guys… that is why Chad Tracy is the interim. It’s about playing the young guys everyday and developing them and not playing Utility guys in there place. It’s about knowing how Manage a game within the game, how to use the bullpen properly, when to remove the starter, how to Manufacture runs etc….
I guarantee that there are guys in that room that are relieved he is gone, because now maybe their roles will be more defined.
Devers this season – .221/.257/.308/.565 and a 62 OPS+ with a negative 0.9 WAR. The Giants are 15 games under .500 since he joined the team. Devers was an expensive cancer that needed to be excised from the Red Sox.
His replacement this season is Willson Contreras.
.239/.362/.398/.760 and a 116 OPS+ with a positive 0.8 WAR
I’ll never understand the people who hated the Devers trade. Look at his numbers and tell me when has he ever been an ELITE player? He’s been a good player but never one who deserved that contract.
That’s just silly. He was one of the top bats in all of baseball from basically the time he got called up. He wasn’t going to age well, and looks awful now but this is just slander.
Giant fan…Devers bad this year. Can’t hit a fastball.
The mediocrity predates Breslow. Yes, his trades alone should put him on the hot seat. But to say Cora shouldn’t have been the first to go is silly. Other teams have been doing more with less talent and payroll for years now.
Whoa
At least he won’t have to spend hours in the Canada Customs lineup next week….
Pretty sure people flying on private jets with agents and team management skip those lines and have customs agents basically checking them on the tarmac to make sure they are who they say they are and have equipment and whatnot checked with equipment managers. All they need to get cleared is their personal items, which for a 3 or 4 day trip across the border isn’t much. Might actually take more time crossing back into the US.
Fire Breslow and Kennedy
I don’t think Kennedy can be conventionally fired. Isn’t he a part owner?
I’d love to have Theo exclusively back, but I also bet he wouldn’t do it.
Pretty sure Kennedy’s a partner so I don’t think we are ever getting rid of him, unfortunately.
17 runs was too little to late apparently.
This was inevitable. Cora’s resistance to change was going to bite him at some point and the team has had many instances of looking totally unprepared. During the post game show the other night Tom Caron, Jim Rice, and Will Middlebrooks asked if players are being taught to play Baseball at the MLB level. This is an organizational issue across the board
One blowout dub wasn’t gonna undig the hole he put them in.
This decision was made before today’s game. They just delayed the announcement based on start time and other factors.
The Decision was made after the Thursday Night game… but really stems back to the game vs the Twins when he hung Crochet out to dry.
I said it then, I turned to the Twins feed because I couldn’t handle listening to Company Man Dave O’Brien making excuses and inability to even address how pathetic Cora was in that game not getting anyone up in the pen until it was 10-0. That Twins announcers were absolutely torching Cora. The next Day one of the guys on the MLB radio lit him up as well. Cora was finally being called out.
Yet, MLB Network just had that moron Jared Carrabas on and him and the talking head from MLB Network were stunned???? What for, dude had completely lost this team.
The most surprising thing to me is that Dillon Lawson got another MLB job after his Yankees stint
Thank god
Team sports are a game of chemistry. Those who say that managers and coaches have nothing to do with wins and losses can’t actually believe that baseball is purely a combination of talent and luck, because if that was the case, no managers would ever separate themselves from the pack, as consistent winners.
Managers and coaches are the clubhouse psychologists, they read the room, pick up on the vibes, and know who needs encouragement, who needs a kick in the butt, and who needs to be left alone, to figure things out for themselves. They recognize the respected voices in the locker room, and which players command attention, and they work the interpersonal relations, to get everyone in the best state of mind.
Those of you who say the manager is irrelevant must never have worked for a great or lousy boss – good management sets the tone for the workplace, assures that the focus is on the right tasks, and can identify the workers who aren’t carrying the load.
Like anything else, a staff in place for too long gets stagnant; “it’s always worked this way”, “these are my top guys”, routines that are no longer effective.
Alex Cora and his coaches have not been out on the field, but there is no sign that they are effectively supporting what has been. So it’s time to change. Breslow, and his role – entirely different issue, and will be addressed separately.
Well said
Kidding Right…..Well said…. and spot on.
Cora’s a cheat and should have been out of baseball long ago. Permanently ineligible. Not that this completely amoral league is capable of a judgement like that anymore.
This was my post hours ago on the Opener about the Orioles:
After seeing the score today, I came here to see how many people the Red Sox had fired.
I was kind of joking at the time.
I’ll be in charge of concession sales !!!
Granted, he’s interim, but I want to see how Chad Tracy does. He’s actually a pretty good manager. I’m glad to see him getting an audition.
I am not a Red Sox fan but a baseball fan. Maybe there’s something I don’t know but this seems like a terrible overreaction this early in season . I realize they’re off to a bad start but I’m sure they will bounce back . Win what 17-1 today . I’m a Cards fan . We have Oli Marmol. See things could be worse
Mike- yes, theres a bunch of stuff you need to catch up on….
Its not an overreaction early this season, its an overly slow reaction for the past five years
Tracy was named Manager of the Year in 2009, only the second manager to win the award after being hired mid-season, joining Jack McKeon for the Florida Marlins.
Like father like son?
Hmmm.
What took so long?
Red Sox ownership taking decisive action, meanwhile Astros ownership wait for ….who know what ?
Waiting for Cora, perhaps
The golden boy has crashed
“You scored 17 runs today. Congrats, you and your boys are canned.”
Maybe this will light a fire under the boys behinds! I thinks it a combination of players underperforming and player we had probably too high of expectations for….Either way I’m glad to see Cora go too may bad decisions hanging Pitchers out to dry when they just didn’t have it, bringing the wrong reliever ext….
The problem still lies in the sox brass upstairs, can they fire themselves please.
Is this a good job? Is travel required? Asking for a friend.
Chad Tracy and Clayton McCullough were teammates at East Carolina University during their playing days (along with current ECU Head Coach Cliff Godwin). Now they’re all in significant leadership positions in baseball. Pretty cool…
He’ll be the Yankees bench coach soon.
Watching the past three games with the Yankees, after all, the camera shot of Cora, the only take I came away with, was the face of a man who felt he was already going to get fired and didn’t give a crap anymore.
No player is going to follow that kind of leadership.
Hal Steinbrenner are you listening here? This is exactly what Steinbrenner should have done to Boone and Cashman 3 yrs ago! Steinbrenner’s problem is he scared of change and does not want to deal with having to gain trust in another GM who will run the ship. Steinbrenner content on just a winning season, make the playoffs and done! Championships not in his blood unlike his father!
Anthony longs for the good old days when George fired managers on what seemed like a yearly basis. That may have been great for the NYC tabloids but it exposed the Yankees as a ballclub no serious free agent or front office executive wanted to be with.
Hal craves stability and the Yankees, under his direction, are a model of a stable ballclub. Can’t say that for the Red Sox or especially the Mets.
Damon? Boggs? Nomar? Ortiz? Martinez? Clemens? Pedroia?
Probably not Manny, though that would be entertaining.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Completely objectively speaking, Cora got lucky with the 2018 squad and has been a mediocre manager overall. He’s had some shrewd moments I was jealous of for his brutal precision in pulling pitchers and swapping guys out and etc.
But he clearly lost his touch.
When a team has been faltering a bit for a few seasons and is now just plain awful, it might not be the manager’s fault, because they can only do so much with the roster they’re given, but when a company’s stock value drops even through outside forces beyond a CEO’s control, ownership brings in new blood, cleans house.
That’s what this was. A very obvious gesture of acknowledging what the Sox are doing isn’t working.
I would guess they try to blow up the team and tease pieces away, rebuild through the draft over the next half decade or so, hope to contend again in the 2030’s.
2030’s lol !!
They made the wildcard last year. That’s contending.
Sox HAVE been rebuilt, they just need to play well. Great pitching and a lot of youth in the lineup. Next comes a great manager and away we go.
2030’s LOL !!!!!
Just looked it up: they have been bad for nearly eight seasons now. Most teams clean house at that point, even if the manager is considered a legend riding high on their old championship glory.
There’s a lot of reasons for the teams overall failures over the last 8 seasons.
One was Chaim Bloom’s errors.
Another was Alex Cora’s failures.
A third comes from upper management/ownership putting individual player spending restrictions in place.
2 ot of 3 have slowly been addressed.
It has only been 7 seasons since 2018. I don’t think Bloom was trying to contend during his almost 4 years in Boston. I think his main objective was to rebuild the farm system. So, I think he fielded teams with a small chance to contend, but which would likely fail leading to high draft picks.
Suit, I was including thr failed start to this season in there as well to get to 8… thus using past and not passed… although, I can see it being confusing outside my head LOL…
We’ve talked a bit about bloom and his philosophy. You can make that argument, I know weve discussed it. Then I bring up blooms mismanagement letting guys walk instead of flipping them for prospects. Then you’ll talk about a soft tank approach… so on so forth.
We.really have had the discussion a few times havent we LOL????
One thing I think we agree on is the MLB roster was left by Bloom an unbalanced shambles, wrong guys were extended and wrong guys let walk, he loved collecting dh-only types, and he mostly disregarding building pitching.
Bloom wouldve been better in boston as an AGM under someone else to work on what he wanted to, if your theory was true …, but, I guess he doesnt leave TB for that.
GA: You are right that Bloom made a lot of mistakes, but I doubt he ever intended to contend until after he rebuilt the farm system. Yes, we have been down this road before.
It is telling how differently he has acted in StL. I think he did possobly learn from the BOS mistakes, although, he is making another one in trying to reacquure guys from when he was here…
I get that he liked them before, so, he should like them now. But id also think he might get more upside out of guys who hadn’t shown most of their ceilings already.
WOW.
I thought this was a delayed April Fool’s joke when I read it.
Wow
Should have done this years ago.
I don’t wanna work- I just wanna bang on the can all day!
no question that Cora had a role to play in the last few topsy turvy Red Sox seasons, and middle management always gets thrown under the bus when things go south, but he shouldn’t be alone in being ousted. Alas, those who should also get the boot own and run the team.
as John Lennon would’ve said- “I’m just sitting here watching the wheels go round and round…”
we’ll always have 2018, Alex. Thank you for your part in that.
Luckily Cora wasn’t alone, and a bevy of coaches joined him since the Fatse philosophy wasn’t working
I think it’s possible David Ross gets a look. Probably why Jason Varitek was let go or reassigned.
Tek is like.., why him not me?
They likely have too many former Cardinals on the team.
I like how they fired him after he started losing, not because of his role in the sign stealing scandal that all of baseball allegedly hates.
He was “fired” but the evil empire still brought him back
Fortunately he didn’t hear this one coming. Good to get one of the real pieces of garbage out of baseball. The amount of hate guys who were young Astros receive because of him is disgusting. Zero accountability. Good riddance.
I will still always wonder about how that Red Sox team was a 90-93 win team then suddenly exploded to an all time great 108 win season in his first season and then went right back to being a 90-93 win team again. If he was doing stuff in Houston, why would anyone assume he wasn’t doing the same stuff in Boston? Glad Warren Morris walked him off in ‘96 and he cried about it on the field.
Maybe a new scandal is coming out soon and this out of left field firing is the Red Sox getting ahead of it?
Not all of baseball. Just some crying fans who can’t get over it.
No surprise here
I haven’t been this astonished by a headline since that awful November morning in 2016.
Keep your head up, friend – the Guardians will win one, you won’t have to wait forever.
Cora supporter here to say I’m ok with this as long as breslow and Kennedy go too. But that’s not happening
Get Joe Gerardi
And Cora’s Operation Scapegoat begins!
It’s about time.
I hate Alex Cora.
Cora will be the Phillies manager by the end of May. He and Dombrowski are tight.
Cora is under contract with the Red Sox until the end of the 2027 season (or he will at least be paid until then). I wonder if a team with need to to send money or a player to the Red Sox if they want to hire him before the end of 2027.
Suit, he was fired. Unless they re-assign him another role in the organization, and, assuming his contract allows that…. its probably more like an outright release?
Maybe they should send him to one of their Latin American development programs?
🤣😂💥
Frankly bizarre for the article’s author to cite Rafaela as a significant problem with this roster. He has made substantial improvements with chasing bad pitches. He has driven in the game winning run in two of the ten wins. He is one of a small handful of players who are IMO unarguable as positive features of the roster.
Sadly, most of these writers are not close to the team and do not do their homework and are just as misinformed as most of the outsiders are that think Cora actually was a good Manager, where the truth is far from it.
The of/dh situation is a joke .5 guys trying to fill 4 positions.Cora was put in a tough situation.I think if he had his way Rafaela,Abreu and Anthony would be in his of.He has no use for Yashida.Imagine paying 18.6 million for a less than part time player.He never should’ve been saddled with this.If the Sox really wanted this guy they would have said he’s the Dh.But hey let’s keep him on the roster even though there was interest from other teams.But Henry wouldn’t eat the contract as they still owe Yashida 33.1 million dollars.He tried with Duran but Duran is damaged goods.
Now what is Sullivan Tire going to do now that their star Manager in their Commercials got the axe?
Can’t wait for the suck ups, like Dave O’Brien…. how are they going spin things. At least Merloni, was somewhat critical at times of what was going on.
BoSox have dipped into their farm system for 2 new coaches. Chad Epperson, the manager at Double-A Portland, is the interim third base coach. Worcester hitting coach Collin Hetzler is joining the hitting staff in Boston.
I came straight to the comments section. Boston fans have been wanting change for a long time, and I’m curious to read their thoughts on the move(s) the team made.
This is exactly the type of situation I set extra popcorn aside for.
Haven’t been able to want good things for Boston since they hired Cora after his time in Houston.
Oh what a glorious day! The cheater is finally done, may he never find a managerial job again.
It’s like checking the engine when you have a tire puncture.
“he is regarded as one of the top managers in the game”
Why does anyone regard him that way?? I’ve been watching Cora make horribly stupid in-game decisions for a loooong time. Bad lineup decisions and some of the most consistently bad bullpen decisions of any manager. The team is perpetually unprepared to start the season every year. Never matters who’s on the field, the fielding is always bad and no one seems to know what to do in the most basic game situations on the field. Been that way for years. Sure, the players like him, he’s known as a players manager, is not heavy on the discipline and just lets players do whatever with no repercussions. But he’s not the brilliant baseball mind that he somehow has cultivated a reputation for.
That 2018 team was literally like an All-Star team. It was a phenomenal roster put together by Dave Dombrowski. Literally anyone I know could have guided that squad to 108 wins. Heck, if it weren’t for Cora, they probably would’ve won 120. They were that good. But he made bad bullpen decisions that year, too. But the team was so good they got away with it most of the time. When the roster was less good (when the owners stopped spending big $$) in the seasons since, a lot of Cora’s crappy decisions have led to losses.
Ultimately where the Red Sox stand today is Breslow’s fault probably more than Cora’s, but Cora has been bad at managing for several years now so it feels appropriate to fire him
I feel like breslow is responsible for the various lineups and pinch hitting. I could wrong but I don’t remember him managing like this years ago. Analytics are ruining baseball
keep the intern rest of the season .. then steal cash from the rays
Not Surprising to me!
Was Expecting a Shakeup.
Red Sox had gone “All in” with trades and free agency.
For some reason, Cora was not able to get the most out the team’s new mix of players.
Seeing the Red Sox in last place and fading fast when they
were supposed to contend for the playoffs and World Series
it was obvious to me that the team was scuffling, underperforming
and that a major shakeup was imminent.
once reporters started referencing 2012 cora’s days were numbered. breslow finally gets to pick his guy. as a yankee fan i hope this means the org’s reliance on driveline only increases
also didn’t help that the team looked completely unprepared to use ABS coming out of spring training
I have the perfect candidate for the Sox job. Derek Kelly/Don Shelton, sorry I can’t tell the difference between the 2, you can have Kelly.
YOU’LL ALWAYS HAVE THE TRASH CANS, Alex, and a city that didn’t give a flip about the trash cans.
Trash can Cora gets Canned.
So what’s next for the guys who have social media accounts under “Fire Alex Cora” or a website to that effect? Do you just plug in the next manager and keep on truckin’?
Run him out of baseball. Along with anyone else in that 2017 team
Why? It wasn’t against the rules for the teams themselves until September of 2017. It wasn’t something that players could be punished for until 2018. Just let it go.
Wow! I thought they should have done so a couple years ago, but to do it less than 30 games into the season says a lot about how badly he must have lost the team. Good luck Red Sox fans. Hopefully the new manager can instill a more workman-like approach to the basics than Cora seemed to require from his players. We are seeing that here in Anaheim from Suzuki and its a welcome change for us, but we don’t have the level of talent you guys do on that roster.
It’ll be interesting to see if they get a bump from this or if the issues run much deeper. There are a few teams that need to keep a close eye on the Sox results over the next 15-30 games.
Funny. He’s not as good without his cans. In fact he’s quite terrible on his own.
Everyone calling this stunning and a surprise hasn’t watched Red Sox baseball this season. It’s been bad. I watch almost every game and I’ve turned a few off. After being down 2-3 runs you just know it’s over. No hits.
As a Sox fan I am thrilled with this. While Cora steered the ship on our 2018 championship I am a firm believer and have been since 2020 that he should have not been brought back after his suspension from Major League Baseball. That was a bad call on the front office staff. I do not condone cheating and it was almost like Henry and Co. were like no problem….well keep the seat warm for you.
As for the other coaches I could care less, but Varitek should have been given the Interim Managerial Tag and Andrew Bailey should have been fired along with Cora. Our offense is god awful and our pitching staff isn’t much better.
I know Henry and Co. love Breslow as we’re now on our second low level GM in a row. His time is running out just like Bloom’s will. This team was not put together very well at all. Breslow has sold us on the idea that all these moves are great but we did a horrendous job in Free Agency and big deal we helped our old GM destroy his new club by adding his aging stars. Bravo Breslow. I am not saying we all need to be the Dodgers but you need to spend money to win in MLB and I do not mean Ranger Suarez as your big ticket signing.
Breslow has also failed in the trade game on another level, the outfield situation is ridiculous and it’s now year 2 of that disaster. I do like all of them however we do not need all of them. Yoshida should have been cut because no one was taking that deal in a trade. And Duran should have moved for a top of the line starter. I wanted Cora gone but Breslow didn’t do him any favors with that situation.
Henry if you’re listening, you’ve made 2 horrible calls on your last GM’s and a bad one in bringing back a suspended manager that you fired once already. Fire Breslow, hire a REAL GM that knows how to build a contender and manage a good young core and hire a proven Manager.
The Red Sox are a Ferrari an this front office takes it to get serviced at Jiffy Lube. Get it right this time, idiots.
I know everyone is eagerly waiting for my opinion since I have followed this team since 1963.
1. This is the only successful ownership team in the history of this team. Sure they won a bunch back in the early 1900’s but they also built the first Yankee dynasty. Its hard to forgive them for that. I know, a lot of different owners in the early 1900’s.
2. Alex Cora is indeed a good manager but unequivically it was time for the change to be made. It’s good that it’s still April and by no means are they out of it. They have an excellent roster and should be a lot better going forward.
3. Varitek is apparently a TBD. He has always wanted to be part of the Red Sox and deservedly so. I would like to see him take over at Worcester to replace Tracy but they haven’t made that move, yet.
4. I like Breslow and Bailey, and really hope they can turn the pitching into what it could become. There’s no reason they can’t have an elite rotation and a solid bullpen.
5. Please locate a hitting coach ASAP. I don’t have anyone in mind but the offense needs to improve a lot. The talent is there to support the pitching.
6. Defense and speed are two other areas of potential. Maybe some hard position decisions need to be made both in terms of fielding and lineup.
7. I won’t be surprised by whatever happens next. Winning, losing, trades, whatever nonsense comes down the pike. But as always, we’ll see.
I’ve been following this team since 1954 and I wouldn’t be so presumptuous as to think that everyone is waiting for my opinion. I remember Lou Boudreau and Pinky Higgins. I remember when the Sox didn’t have the talent to compete. This team does.
Cora had to go. He lost the team and the fan base. The only ones he had left were the talking heads, the so-called experts who if they really knew what they were talking about would be running a team not talking about someone else running a team.
Every player on this team was lost at the plate. Totally lost. That’s a coaching/management problem.
Furthermore, Cora has never had his team prepared to play at the beginning of the season. There is no excuse for that.
Henry made the right call.
I was being very tongue in cheek in that first sentence. I fully realize that nobody cares what I think. But I do totally appreciate your position and find it impossible to disagree with.
I was waiting for whyhayzee to comment here.., and he did not disappoint. I like your comment as well PK. Many excellent observations !!
I’ve been following the Red Sox in a major way since 1978. I suppose I’m the youngster here lol 😃
One thing I know for sure is that many look forward to what I write. But that’s because I stick my foot in my mouth way more often than I provide a decent opinion lol
Gary, in 1978, I lived in a town in New Jersey that shall go unnamed. Let me just point out that in that town also lived Bucky Dent and Goose Gossage, the two players who ripped my heart out in 1978.
Yup 1978. I came home from school in San Diego not realizing that the Red Sox were already on television that afternoon in the Yankees one game playoff.
I missed Buckys Homer, but saw Yaz pop out to third in his final at bat.
Not so bad as I thought they would be back the next year with that excellent team.
My big heartbreak was 86. Calvin Schiraldi, one strike away.
86 almost ruined my marriage. We celebrate 40 this year. I’m still in love, I hope she is.
They should have traded Duran for a haul while they still could. He’s been losing value for 2 years.
Some of us were after that big time after his MVP type season at age 27.
When things slowed down after the aberration, we could see his fluke year would probably not happen again. A 30 year-old who wants to get paid but has a game built on speed and athleticism alone, won’t produce by year three of that proposed new five year deal.
But here we are. He can still get it done if he shakes this mental part of the batters box struggle.
Carlos Mendoza next?
Somehow one of the more surprising and yet least surprising moves I expected. Cora’s firing seemed inevitable… Bigger surprise is they cleaned house. I expected them to give Vasquez a shot, not bring up Tracy. hough as I think about it, Tracy seems like the better move if they’re going with someone the kids already know and respect.
Cora and Ramon are basically attached at the hip. Im not surprised they went together.
Breslow consolidates his power. He now has a short widow to turn this around. Stay tuned.
Without getting into the merits of Cora, our hitting approach looked really bad. Story, Durbin & Duran are all about 200 points behind 2025. I think Fatse had to go.
I was expecting Fatse to be fired after Fridays game to be honest. I was shocked to see them go right for Cora and the rest of them all at once.
Seems like a panic move to me unless there were some real clubhouse problems. Wholesale housecleaning is for the offseason. There’s no time for resets during the season with games every day.
Cora’s demeanor this whole season, including spring training, indicated he knew he wasn’t going to finish the year with the Red Sox, he didn’t care, and wasn’t very interested either. Not a good look for Red Sox fans. Good effing riddance…
I dont think this is an accurate statement at all. Why would he think he wouldnt finish the season? This is an ownership problem above all. Henry apparently is in Baltimore but couldnt be bothered to show up to the press conference today. He is the real problem.
Nothing about that 2018 team was special except the results. Four position players were below average and the catchers were abysmal. Only two starters qualified with 162+ innings and one had a barely average ERA. The bullpen was not that great and Kimbrel was not as good as usual. So, they were not some powerhouse team. But what they did have was a new manager. This team doesn’t always succeed with new managers but there is a precedent.
Wondering when they informed him, before or after the game?
I assume after. I think once that’s it that’s it. I think some managers are fired the morning of and an assistant manager or a minor league manager is brought in for that day’s game post haste.
About time !! Amen
Umpires: HP: Alex Tosi. 1B: Cory Blaser.
At quick glance I saw Alex and Cory and thought, wait, he’s umpiring now?
Karma for a cheater.