Blue Jays Designate Eloy Jiménez For Assignment
The Blue Jays have reinstated outfielder/designated hitter George Springer from the 10-day injured list. In a corresponding move, designated hitter Eloy Jiménez has been designated for assignment. Hazel Mae of Sportsnet was first to report the moves.
It’s the inverse of a transaction from a couple of weeks ago. Springer fractured a bone in his left big toe when he fouled a ball off of his foot. On April 12th, he was placed on the IL, with Jiménez selected to take his place on the roster. Now that Springer is healthy enough to return, Jiménez has been bumped off.
In the meantime, Jiménez wasn’t able to do much to secure a longer look. He didn’t play the field, continuing a recent trend of his. He only played eight innings in the outfield in 2024 and none in 2025. As a bat-only player, he needs to hit to provide value, but he wasn’t able to do much of that. His .290 batting average looks nice but he didn’t produce an extra-base hit, leading to a .290/.343/.290 slash line and 82 wRC+, indicating he was 18% worse than league average at the plate overall.
That’s a small sample size of 35 plate appearances but continues a trend that began a few years ago. Though Jiménez was potent slugger for much of the 2019 to 2023 window, he hasn’t been in good form since. In 2024, he hit just six home runs in 98 games, leading to a .238/.289/.336 line and 78 wRC+. He didn’t play in the majors last year, spending the season in the minors, where he hit a combined .247/.326/.347 between the Triple-A teams of the Rays and the Jays.
There was a bit of optimism among some Jays fans when Jiménez put up a decent .286/.333/.524 line in spring training this year, followed by a .257/.372/.371 line in 11 Triple-A games. But as mentioned, his big league numbers were uninspiring. With Springer now back and likely to be in the DH spot most of the time, there wasn’t going to be much use for Jiménez.
Jiménez now heads into DFA limbo, which can last as long as a week. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so the Jays could take as long as five days to field trade interest, but they could also put him on waivers sooner if they so choose. Given his recent track record, it’s likely he will clear waivers. As a veteran with at least five years of major league service time, he has the right to reject an outright assignment and instead elect free agency. It’s possible the Jays will skip that step and just release him.
For the Jays, their hope is that greater health can steady the ship for them. They are out to a shaky 13-16 start as they have been battling a large number of injuries. They just got Trey Yesavage back in the mix yesterday and now Springer has rejoined the roster as well. José Berríos and Addison Barger could be next, with guys like Nathan Lukes and Alejandro Kirk ideally returning to the club in the not-too-distant future as well.
Photo courtesy of Mark J. Rebilas, Imagn Images
Red Sox Place Garrett Crochet On Injured List
The Red Sox have placed ace Garrett Crochet on the 15-day injured list due to inflammation in his left shoulder, per a club announcement. Utilityman Nate Eaton has been recalled from Triple-A Worcester to fill Crochet’s spot on the roster for the time being.
Crochet tells Christopher Smith of MassLive.com that he’s “pretty confident” he’ll be back after a minimum stay on the injured list. The 6’6″ lefty said he felt some fatigue during his last start, which prompted the team to take a cautious route and shut him down for the time being. He hasn’t stopped throwing, per Smith, so it seems the club also does not fear a lengthy layoff.
It’s been a strange start to the 26-year-old’s season. He’s turned in three quality starts — two of them scoreless six-inning gems — but also been hit hard on three occasions. In particular, Crochet was bludgeoned by the Twins in a visit to Target Field that saw him tagged for a career-worst 11 runs (10 earned) in only 1 2/3 innings. A drubbing that extreme, this early in the season, will take awhile to recover from — hence Crochet’s grisly 6.30 earned run average through his first six starts.
The average velocity on Crochet’s four-seamer and sinker is down this year, albeit not egregiously so. He’s down about 0.6 mph on the former (from 96.4 mph to 95.8 mph) and 0.8 mph on the latter (from 96 mph to 95.2 mph). It bears noting that Crochet’s velocity sat in a similar range through his first six starts last season but climbed as the season progressed. That brutal day in Minnesota featured his lowest single-game averages of any start this season (94.9 mph and 94.2 mph, respectively).
In swapping out Eaton for Crochet, the Sox will be playing a pitcher short today. They’d originally released a lineup without Roman Anthony, presumably to get him consecutive rest days — the Sox are off tomorrow — after his recent struggles with back pain. They’ve since released an amended lineup with Anthony atop the order and Jarren Duran out. Eaton’s recall to the roster gives interim manager Chad Tracy a full contingent of four bench options even if the Sox are trying to get Duran a breather for a couple days.
Boston’s rotation for the weekend will need to be reshuffled. Crochet, Connelly Early and Ranger Suarez would’ve been lined up to take the mound had everyone remained on turn, but they’ll have some choices now. They could move Early and Suarez up to start Friday and Saturday, respectively, as tomorrow’s off-day would keep them on regular rest. Smith also noted last night that prospect Jake Bennett was scratched from yesterday’s start in Triple-A Worcester. Tracy told the Sox beat that the team was just keeping its options open with an off-day Thursday; the reason for keeping those options open is now much clearer.
Bennett, 25, would be making his major league debut if he gets the call for a spot start. Acquired in an offseason trade with the Nationals, he’s begun the season with a 0.86 ERA in five starts and 21 innings with Triple Worcester. Bennett’s 20.3% strikeout rate is below average, but he’s only walked 3.8% of his opponents this season. He’s never sustained that level of command in the past, and he’s currently benefiting from a minuscule .207 average on balls in play, but there’s no denying it’s been a strong start to his season.
Bennett is already on the 40-man roster, which surely works in his favor as well. If not this weekend, it seems likely he’ll make his debut at some point before too long. In addition to Crochet, the Red Sox also have Sonny Gray, Johan Oviedo, Kutter Crawford, Patrick Sandoval and Tanner Houck on the injured list.
White Sox Select Jarred Kelenic
The White Sox announced Wednesday that they’ve selected the contract of outfielder Jarred Kelenic from Triple-A Charlotte. Fellow outfielder Everson Pereira has been diagnosed with a pectoral strain and placed on the 10-day injured list. The Sox already had a 40-man vacancy, which Kelenic fills, so no additional moves are necessary.
A former top-10 pick in the draft and top-10 prospect in all of baseball, Kelenic has yet to find his footing in the majors. He’s been traded from the Mets to the Mariners (as a prospect) and then, after a lackluster run in Seattle, to the Braves in what effectively amounted to Atlanta paying close to $30MM (between bad contracts being eaten and the associated luxury taxes) in order to purchase Kelenic.
Now 26 years old, Kelenic has played in parts of five big league seasons between Seattle and Atlanta. He’s a career .211/.282/.376 hitter — about 16% worse than league-average, by measure of wRC+. The lefty-swinging outfielder has popped 49 homers and swiped 31 bags in 1488 career plate appearances, but he’s also gone down on strikes in just shy of 31% of his trips to the batter’s box.
The White Sox brought Kelenic in on a minor league deal this offseason after the Braves cut their losses and moved on. He’s hitting just .202 in Charlotte but has reached base at a .346 clip and has slugged .464. Kelenic started the season hitless in 21 plate appearances but has righted the ship since. Over his past 65 turns at the plate he’s hitting .262/.422/.600 with six homers and four doubles. He’s still fanned in a quarter of his plate appearances even during that hot streak, but he’s also drawn walks at a huge 21% clip.
Kelenic is out of minor league options, so he’ll have to stick on the roster or else be designated for assignment. With Pereira joining infield/outfield utilitymen Brooks Baldwin and Tanner Murray on the injured list, Chicago’s outfield collection right now includes Andrew Benintendi, Luisangel Acuña, Austin Hays, Tristan Peters, Sam Antonacci and Kelenic. It’s anything but a settled and established group, so Kelenic could well have an opportunity to carve out some playing time if he hits the ground running.
The 25-year-old Pereira is a former top prospect himself. He was out to a decent start this season, hitting .250/.310/.453 with three homers in 71 trips to the plate. Like Kelenic, he comes with major swing-and-miss concerns. He’d fanned in 29.6% of those 71 plate appearances and posted a well below-average 66.2% contact rate. The Sox picked him up in a minor offseason trade sending relievers Steven Wilson and Yoendrys Gomez to the Rays.
2026-27 Club Options: AL Central
Last week, MLBTR began a division by division series looking at the club/mutual option decisions facing every team in the American League East. We’ll continue with a move to the AL Central. There aren’t a ton of notable decisions in this division, but the Tigers will have a couple — one involving their likely Hall of Fame closer.
Chicago White Sox
- Austin Hays, OF: $8MM mutual option ($1MM buyout)
Hays signed a $6MM free agent guarantee with the White Sox over the offseason. He’s making a $5MM salary and will collect a $1MM buyout on an $8MM mutual option for 2027. That’s an accounting measure designed to delay paying the final million until the end of the season. This is essentially a one-year deal.
The righty-swinging Hays has worked mostly in a platoon capacity over the past few seasons. He signed with Chicago largely because he felt they offered the best path to everyday playing time. Hays started slowly, striking out 12 times in his first nine games. He landed on the injured list with a strained right hamstring and missed three weeks.
The Sox activated him on Monday but have turned left field over to rookie Sam Antonacci in the interim. With Everson Pereira out to a nice start in the opposite corner, Hays is probably back in a fourth outfield role.
Cleveland Guardians
- Shawn Armstrong, RHP: $8MM mutual option ($1.5MM buyout)
Cleveland reunited with Armstrong on a one-year, $5.5MM contract in free agency. The veteran reliever is making $4MM this year and guaranteed a $1.5MM buyout on an $8MM mutual option.
The Guardians are likely to decline their end even if Armstrong pitches up to expectations. He’ll be entering his age-36 season and doesn’t have the power arsenal that usually pays in free agency. Armstrong’s fastball sits around 93 mph and he has never had huge swinging strike rates. He’s more of a command-oriented reliever, though he has walked seven batters over his first 10 2/3 frames this season.
Armstrong has had a tougher time getting hitters to expand the strike zone, leading to the uptick in free passes. He has given up five runs but has fanned 13 of 47 batters faced. He has three holds while working in mostly medium leverage situations. Armstrong landed on the injured list on Monday with a right groin strain.
- Emmanuel Clase, RHP: $10MM club option ($2MM buyout)
Clase is on unpaid non-administrative leave pending the investigation into an alleged game-fixing scheme. He’s not making his $6MM salary this year, nor does it seem likely he’ll collect the $2MM option buyout.
- Trevor Stephan, RHP: $7.25MM club option ($1.25MM buyout)
Stephan’s career has unfortunately gone off the rails since he underwent Tommy John surgery in March 2024. His velocity was down three miles per hour when he returned, and Triple-A hitters teed off for 22 runs in 17 innings last year. Cleveland dropped Stephan from their 40-man roster in August. He made four appearances this spring but was working with even lesser velocity than he had last summer, sitting at just 90.7 mph after throwing 95-96 early during his early-career days as a setup arm. The Guardians haven’t assigned him to a minor league affiliate. This is an easy buyout.
Detroit Tigers
- Drew Anderson: $10MM club option (no buyout)
Detroit brought Anderson back to the organization after a season and a half in Korea. The right-hander was second among KBO pitchers with 245 strikeouts a year ago, partially because he added a “kick-changeup” he hadn’t fully trusted during his last stint in affiliated ball. The Tigers guaranteed him $7MM with a $10MM club option.
The righty was initially expected to compete for a rotation spot. That changed after the Framber Valdez and Justin Verlander signings. Anderson began the season in long relief. It has been an erratic start, as he has allowed 11 runs through his first 15 innings. Anderson has recorded 17 strikeouts but has walked eight batters and surrendered three home runs. Detroit opted to give Keider Montero a rotation spot when Verlander went down with a hip injury.
There’s still a chance for Anderson to make some starts throughout the season. He’ll at least provide some swing-and-miss upside to a bullpen that lacks that element. It’s too early to have a definitive call on the option, but the early showing points toward it being declined.
- Kenley Jansen: $12MM club option ($2MM buyout)
Coming off a quietly excellent season with the Angels, Jansen signed for $11MM with Detroit. He’s making $9MM this season and has a $2MM buyout on a $12MM team option, making it a $10MM call for the front office. That’s a reasonable enough sum that the Tigers would probably exercise it with a typical Jansen year.
The four-time All-Star is 6-8 in save opportunities so far. Seven of his nine appearances have been scoreless. Detroit has taken the loss in the other two — both of which came on go-ahead home runs (to Jose Fernandez and Nathaniel Lowe, respectively). Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris pointed to the still strong swing-and-miss numbers on Jansen’s cutter at the time of the signing. He’s missing bats at the same rate as he did last year and has the second-highest strikeout rate (28.1%) in the Detroit bullpen. If the home runs turn out to a blip, this should get picked up.
Kansas City Royals
- Carlos Estévez, RHP: $13MM club option ($2MM buyout)
The first season of Estévez’s two-year, $22MM free agent deal with Kansas City was a success. He led MLB with 42 saves while matching his career low with a 2.45 ERA across 66 innings. Estévez’s personal-low 20.1% strikeout rate and 8.2% swinging strike mark were red flags, but he entered this spring with a clear hold on the closer role.
Estévez hasn’t looked the same in 2026. His velocity was way down both during Spring Training and in the World Baseball Classic. The Royals expressed some optimism that’d come with more adrenaline during regular season play. It didn’t happen during his debut, as the two-time All-Star’s fastball averaged just 91.2 mph after sitting around 96 a year ago. His slider and changeup also had precipitous drops. Estévez retired just one of seven batters in a meltdown loss to the Braves that culminated in a Dominic Smith walk-off grand slam.
After the game, the Royals placed Estévez on the injured list with a left foot contusion. He sustained that injury during the March 28 appearance against Atlanta, as he took a Michael Harris II comebacker off his foot. That doesn’t explain why the stuff was so poor during camp, though it has given the Royals a month and counting to hopefully get him right.
Coming into the year, the Royals probably anticipated exercising this option. That’s much tougher to see unless they find some kind of mechanical tweak that gets him back into the mid-90s.
Minnesota Twins
- Josh Bell, 1B: $10MM mutual option ($1.25MM buyout)
Minnesota signed Bell to a $7MM free agent guarantee over the winter. That includes a $1.25MM buyout on a $10MM mutual option. Bell’s first month in the Twin Cities has been a microcosm of his last few years. He came out on fire, hitting .317 with three home runs through his first 13 games. He’s hitting .180 with just one extra-base hit (a double) over his past 16 outings. The end result is a league average .235/.331/.373 line through his first 118 plate appearances. Each Bell season has big highs and very tough lows, though they all tend to conclude with slightly above-average offensive production overall.
Bell is a low-end regular at this stage of his career. The Twins — or a potential taker at the trade deadline — are likely to pass on their end of the option. If he does get traded, Minnesota might need to cover a portion of the buyout, as he’d otherwise cost an accruing team nearly $3MM for the final two months of the season.
- Justin Topa, RHP: $5MM mutual option ($250K buyout)
Topa and the Twins built a $5MM mutual option into his agreement to avoid arbitration last November. He has played on salaries just above $1MM throughout his arbitration window. Topa gets ground-balls but has the American League’s lowest swinging strike rate (3.8%) and has battled injuries throughout his career. The Twins are likely to pass on their end.
Joe Ryan’s arbitration deal includes a $13MM mutual option ($100K buyout) for 2027. He’d remain under club control if the option is declined and won’t hit free agency until the 2027-28 offseason.
Angels Designate Joey Lucchesi For Assignment
The Angels recalled lefty Mitch Farris from Triple-A Salt Lake and designated fellow left-hander Joey Lucchesi for assignment, the club announced Wednesday.
Lucchesi was selected to the major league roster Sunday, marking his second stint of the season with the Halos. The 32-year-old pitched in Sunday’s game and again last night, combining for an inning of work and surrendering three runs. The well-traveled southpaw has totaled 3 1/3 frames in the majors with the Angels this season and been tagged for five runs on seven hits, six walks and a hit batter. He’s fanned four of his 24 opponents (16.7%).
Lucchhesi made 56 solid starts for the Padres in 2018-19, his first two seasons in the big leagues, but has since bounced around the league, working mostly as a reliever and swingman. Dating back to the 2020 season, he’s pitched 142 2/3 innings for four teams (Padres, Mets, Giants, Angels) and logged a 4.16 ERA with a 19.4% strikeout rate and 9% walk rate.
The Angels have already designated Lucchesi for assignment once this season. He passed through waivers unclaimed, elected free agency, and quickly re-signed on a new minor league contract. About two weeks later, he was back in the majors. A similar sequence could well play out again, though a team in need of some left-handed depth could always scoop him up to fill a short-term need. Lucchesi will be traded, placed on waivers or released within the next five days. Waivers are a 48-hour process, meaning his latest DFA will be resolved within a week’s time.
MLBTR Podcast: The Alex Cora Situation, Lucas Giolito Signs, And The Phillies Fire Rob Thomson
The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.
This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Steve Adams of MLB Trade Rumors to discuss…
- The Red Sox firing manager Alex Cora and several coaches (0:30)
- The Padres signing Lucas Giolito (27:30)
- The Phillies firing manager Rob Thomson and releasing Taijuan Walker (39:00)
- The Guardians promoting prospect Travis Bazzana (59:45)
Check out our past episodes!
- Kevin McGonigle, The Padres’ Franchise Valuation, And Edwin Díaz To Miss Time – listen here
- Lenyn Sosa Traded, And Injury Concerns For The Astros, Cubs And Orioles – listen here
- Previewing The 2026-27 Free-Agent Class – listen here
The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff. Check out their Facebook page here!
Photo courtesy of Troy Taormina, Imagn Images
Braves Designate Carlos Carrasco For Assignment
The Braves designated right-hander Carlos Carrasco for assignment on Wednesday, per a club announcement. His spot on the roster will go to left-hander Dylan Lee, who has been reinstated from the paternity list.
Carrasco pitched one perfect inning for Atlanta and picked up a strikeout in that spotless frame. His call to the roster always seemed likely to be short term in nature. Carrasco signed a minor league deal with the Braves over the winter after pitching 13 2/3 innings for them down the stretch last year. The Braves designated Carrasco for assignment last August and quickly re-signed him to a minor league deal. He re-signed on another minor league pact over the winter, which seems to suggest he’s amenable to a Jesse Chavez-style arrangement in Atlanta, where Chavez was frequently brought to the majors, cut loose, and re-signed as minor league depth.
The 39-year-old Carrasco opened the 2026 season with four sharp starts in Triple-A Gwinnett. He’s tossed 21 innings for the Stripers and notched a sparkling 1.71 ERA with a 20.7% strikeout rate against a 5.7% walk rate. It’s at least feasible that another club in need of depth might place a speculative claim or talk to the Braves about a possible cash trade, but most veteran DFAs of this nature will see the player hit the open market one way or another. Given the recent history between Carrasco and Atlanta, there’s a decent chance he’s released or rejects an outright assignment and quickly re-signs a new minor league deal.
Carrasco has now pitched in parts of 17 major league seasons. He has more than 14 years of big league service and owns a lifetime 4.22 ERA with a 24% strikeout rate and 6.6% walk rate. If he ends up back in Gwinnett, he’ll probably stay stretched out in the rotation there and wait for another opportunity to bring a fresh arm to the big league bullpen or perhaps make a spot start or two in the rotation, as injuries necessitate.
Yankees Designate Randal Grichuk For Assignment
The Yankees announced Wednesday that veteran outfielder Randal Grichuk has been designated for assignment. His spot on the roster goes to top pitching prospect Elmer Rodriguez, whose previously reported promotion to the majors is now official.
Grichuk, 34, signed a minor league deal with the Yankees over the winter and made the roster despite a shaky spring performance. The 13-year veteran was brought in as a right-handed bat to provide some punch against lefties, ideally platooning with lefty-swinging Trent Grisham, but Grichuk hasn’t found his footing in a limited role. He’s taken 33 plate appearances and delivered a meek .194/.212/.323 batting line with 10 punchouts.
It’s been a tough couple of seasons for Grichuk, who posted a .228/.273/.401 line (82 wRC+) in 293 plate appearances between Arizona and Kansas City last year. However, he’s also not far removed from a 2024 campaign that saw him post a superlative .291/.348/.528 slash (139 wRC+) during his first season with the D-backs.
Grichuk had plenty of run as a low-OBP, power-focused regular with the Blue Jays earlier in his career. He’s a lifetime .250/.297/.464 hitter with 212 homers in the big leagues. Grichuk has long been a thorn in the side of left-handed pitchers, and as he’s aged into his 30s, he’s taken on a more limited platoon role. He didn’t hit lefties in his tiny sample with the Yankees, and he struggled against them in uncharacteristic fashion last year as well. Despite the recent downturn, however, he still carries a career .268/.318/.498 line against southpaws.
The Yankees will have five days to trade Grichuk, place him on outright waivers or release him. The latter option is likeliest. Any team to acquire Grichuk or claim him would be taking on the remainder of the prorated $2.5MM salary on his minor league deal. Given his tough start to the season and last year’s struggles, that seems unlikely. If he’s released, he’ll be able to sign with any club seeking some righty-hitting corner outfield depth. Grichuk does have 3677 career innings in center, but the vast majority of that work came earlier in his career; he’s played only 147 frames in center dating back to 2023 and hasn’t graded out as a clearly above-average defender there since 2019.
Today’s swap of Rodriguez for Grichuk balances out the Yankees’ big league roster. They’ve spent the past couple days playing with 14 position players and 12 pitchers while holding off on a decision regarding Giancarlo Stanton‘s IL status. The Yankees finally placed Stanton on the IL due to a low-grade calf strain last night and replaced him with utilityman Max Schuemann, who was recalled from Triple-A. Jettisoning Grichuk and bringing up Rodriguez again gives the Yankees 13 pitchers and 13 position players, putting their bullpen back at full strength and returning them to a four-man bench.
The Opener: Ohtani, Rodriguez, Mattingly
Rays third baseman Junior Caminero seems to have avoided serious injury after fouling a ball off his face on Tuesday. He reached for a Tanner Bibee breaking ball and nicked it, sending it straight down. The ball careened off the plate and struck Caminero in the jaw (h/t Talkin’ Baseball for the video). He was able to finish the at-bat, but was removed on defense.
1. Pitcher-only Ohtani deals again
For the second time this season, Shohei Ohtani did not hit in a game he pitched. The right-hander fired six innings of one-run ball against the Marlins. After reaching six innings just four times last year (including the playoffs), Ohtani has completed six frames in all five starts so far. The outing against Miami actually raised his ERA from 0.38 to 0.60. Ohtani was pitching on regular rest for the first time this season, which was part of the reason he wasn’t in the hitting lineup. “I’m always going to respect the decision regardless whether I’m pitching or doing both,” Ohtani told reporters through an interpreter (h/t Alden Gonzalez of ESPN). “I also understand the importance of getting to the end of the season with everybody healthy.”
2. Yankees pitching prospect to make debut
Right-hander Elmer Rodriguez is expected to be promoted for his MLB debut against the Rangers on Wednesday. The 22-year-old is among the top pitching prospects in New York’s system. Rodriguez came over from the Red Sox in the Carlos Narvaez trade. Boston has already reaped the rewards of the deal, with Narvaez developing into a viable everyday backstop. Now it’s the Yankees’ turn to find out how they fared in the trade. Rodriguez climbed from High-A all the way to Triple-A in 2025. He’s delivered a 1.27 ERA across four starts with Scranton/Wilkes-Barre this season.
3. Mattingly off to 1-0 start
The Phillies cruised to a shutout win over the Giants behind seven strong innings from Jesus Luzardo. It’s the first victory for interim manager Don Mattingly, who took over after Rob Thomson was fired on Tuesday. Mattingly is now 10 wins shy of reaching 900 victories as a big-league manager. He led the Dodgers to five straight winning seasons from 2011 to 2015. Los Angeles won three consecutive division titles in that stretch, but postseason success eluded the club. Mattingly’s run with the Marlins wasn’t as successful. Miami finished above .500 just once during his seven seasons in charge, and that was the shortened 2020 campaign. Mattingly will be tasked with turning around a Philadelphia squad that is currently tied with the Mets for the worst record in baseball.
Photo courtesy of Jayne Kamin-Oncea, Imagn Images
Alex Cora Not Expected To Pursue Another Managerial Opportunity This Season
It doesn’t appear as if Alex Cora will be in another major league dugout in 2026. Pete Abraham of The Boston Globe writes that the former Red Sox skipper plans to spend time with his young sons in his native Puerto Rico rather than jump directly back into managing. Chris Cotillo of MassLive reported similarly this morning, writing that Cora’s current focus is on his family.
The 2018 World Series champion could have landed a new opportunity within hours of being fired by the Sox on Saturday. Bob Nightengale of USA Today reported this morning that the Phillies offered their managerial position to Cora before settling on Don Mattingly as interim skipper for the rest of 2026. Philly president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski more or less confirmed as much in a press conference this afternoon.
Dombrowski stopped short of saying there was a formal contract offer on the table, but he confirmed the job would have been Cora’s had he wanted it. Dombrowski told reporters (including Mark Feinsand of MLB.com) that he discussed the position with Cora on Sunday morning, less than 24 hours after the Boston change.
“We talked about potentially taking the job. I had told him I had really come to the conclusion at that point that if he took it, I was going to make a change. I thought that he might take it, but as time went on over the next day into Monday morning, it was apparent from his perspective that he wanted to take time with his family,” Dombrowski said.
Cora and Dombrowski have a strong relationship from their time together with the Red Sox. They overlapped between 2018-19, winning the aforementioned championship in the first season. Boston parted ways with Dombrowski at the end of a disappointing ’19 campaign. They fired Cora a few months later after his role in the Astros’ 2017 sign-stealing operation became public. Cora served a one-year suspension, and the Red Sox re-hired him after the 2020 season.
The second stint lasted five-plus seasons and made him one of the sport’s highest-paid managers. Cora’s most recent extension runs through 2027 and reportedly pays him $7.25MM annually. The Red Sox will remain on the hook for that money if Cora doesn’t take another managerial position in the interim.
If another team hires him before his deal with Boston expires, his new salary would be subtracted from the Red Sox’s obligations. However, Feinsand reports that any hiring team is required to pay “fair market value” for an MLB manager — at least a few million dollars — to hire Cora rather than signing him for virtually nothing and leaving Boston on the hook for the entire sum. Of course, that’d be a moot point if Cora decides not to pursue managerial jobs in 2027 either.
Cora’s conversation with Dombrowski about a potential reunion in Philadelphia came before the team announced they were firing Rob Thomson. Dombrowski decided a change was necessary and went through with that dismissal even after Cora passed. They informed Thomson of the decision on Tuesday morning, roughly two hours before they made the formal announcement (link via Matt Gelb of The Athletic).
Thomson also met with reporters on Tuesday. He said he had no issue with Dombrowski’s conversation with Cora while he was still the manager. “I think Dave’s just doing his due diligence,” Thomson said (via Gelb). “He had made up his mind and he was going to move forward. … Dave and I have a close relationship, but that doesn’t stand in the way of him doing the right thing for the organization. I respect that.” The former skipper spoke highly of the team and said he’d “seriously entertain” an advisory position down the line if the Phillies make him an offer (via Lochlahn March of The Philadelphia Inquirer).