Is Alex Cora On the Hot Seat? Should He Be?

Cora is safe, because JH likes him. Most likely Cora was hired back the first time, because of JH, and most likely his last extension was, because of JH. 

1 hour ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Yes and yes.  But I think it's extremely unlikely he gets fired in-season.  And it's way too early. 

Way too early?

Since 2018, the Sox are 435-421 under Cora, despite having a payroll in the upper half (and in most seasons, upper third) of MLB.  John Farrell was 432-378 as Boston manager, won more AL East pennants than any manager in team history, and was coming off back-to-back pennants when he got fired…

1 hour ago, jdc69 said:

I wonder how much is Cora and how much is the analytics department. It sounds to me like they have more weight than is talked about, especially when one of them can tell Jim Rice not to talk to a prospect. If Cora is on the hot seat, they should get rid of the analytics and tell Cora to manage his way out this himself.

Cora is the analytics department.  Figuratively speaking.

Houston originally hired him because of his expertise in those matters,  and Boston lured him away from Houston for that same reason.  He’s been a big part of educating both organizations on how to use analytics…

16 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

Coldest seat in MLB

Daddy is the owner.

1 minute ago, mvp 78 said:

Henry loves Cora. He’d fire Sammy first.

And Cora would take Sammy’s job.

1 minute ago, mvp 78 said:

Henry loves Cora. He’d fire Sammy first.

8 minutes ago, TheSplinteredSplendor said:

Alex Cora Officially on Hot Seat After Red Sox Rival Fires Manager

The only way Alex Cora gets on the hot seat is if JH was to put him there, and I don’t see that happening anytime soon. What the O’s did has NO bearing on what JH will do, and I don’t believe Brez has enough power to do anything anyway.

21 hours ago, notin said:

Way too early?

Since 2018, the Sox are 435-421 under Cora, despite having a payroll in the upper half (and in most seasons, upper third) of MLB.  John Farrell was 432-378 as Boston manager, won more AL East pennants than any manager in team history, and was coming off back-to-back pennants when he got fired…

As we've all seen and complained about for a half decade: "upper payrolls" do not equate to upper rosters.

We've complained for years about all the bad signings and poor roster construction, then blame Cora for not making awful teams win.

I'm not arguing that Cora could do no better. I do think he makes mistakes and has some serious flaws, but the teams he was handed from 2020-2024 were jokes, even the 2021 team was not good, on paper (in March.)

10 minutes ago, Old Red said:

The only way Alex Cora gets on the hot seat is if JH was to put him there, and I don’t see that happening anytime soon. What the O’s did has NO bearing on what JH will do, and I don’t believe Brez has enough power to do anything anyway.

The funny thing is, if Brez gets his way, assuming he wants Cora out, Cora might end up replacing Brez in the FO.

1 minute ago, moonslav59 said:

The funny thing is, if Brez gets his way, assuming he wants Cora out, Cora might end up replacing Brez in the FO.

I think Cora has a direct line to JH anyway.

2 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

Well, I think we're overstating JH's loyalty to Cora bit.  JH is still a businessman first and foremost.

I agree, but what do you think is more important to JH the business side of things, or WL?

17 minutes ago, Old Red said:

I think Cora has a direct line to JH anyway.

We know you think this, and that may be why he might be on a path to being our GM or whatever they call them, these days.

There might be an alignment where Brez and Cora share key duties, but it will be interesting to see what happens and who does what, if and when Cora is promoted.

IMO, Brez has seemingly improved the Sox in several areas. It remains to be seen, and I know wins is all you judge a GM by, so we may disagree on the term "improvements," but the efforts made to improve the pitching from top to bottom are noticeable, but again, we have to wait out the results to say if it worked or not.

It was Brez, not Cora that changed the roster construction to pretty much force Cora to move Devers off 3B. Some might say it was not a clear and good idea, but the attempt was made to improve a defense that was horrifical for the last 2 or more years. The offense may have some serious question, and some bloated contracts (inherited by Brez,) but when you look at the team control, and low cost for many of our key players over the next 2-6 years, I'd say the starting 9 and bench look pretty solid, now and for the next few years.

We've seen a noticeable increase in pitchers drafted and draft bonuses given to pitchers over everyday players. We even saw more IFA money going to pitchers than in our recent past. Delzine & Cordero got $850K in bonuses. I think that's more than all the IFA pitching bonuses paid the previous year, combined. In 2023, the top 7-8 pitchers signed made that much , combined. In 2022, the most we paid was $125K and the total was about $200K on all signed pitchers. The 2021 signing period, we spent close to $850K on the top 3 pitchers signed, which was close.

I like what Brez is doing. I'm not sure Cora would do better. I'm no where near as high on Cora as I was after 2018, but I still like him as our manager, and I blame JH and the GMs for our failures after 2018 way, way, way more than I blame Cora. (That's not to say Cora is blameless.)

2 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

We know you think this, and that may be why he might be on a path to being our GM or whatever they call them, these days.

There might be an alignment where Brez and Cora share key duties, but it will be interesting to see what happens and who does what, if and when Cora is promoted.

IMO, Brez has seemingly improved the Sox in several areas. It remains to be seen, and I know wins is all you judge a GM by, so we may disagree on the term "improvements," but the efforts made to improve the pitching from top to bottom are noticeable, but again, we have to wait out the results to say if it worked or not.

It was Brez, not Cora that changed the roster construction to pretty much force Cora to move Devers off 3B. Some might say it was not a clear and good idea, but the attempt was made to improve a defense that was horrifical for the last 2 or more years. The offense may have some serious question, and some bloated contracts (inherited by Brez,) but when you look at the team control, and low cost for many of our key players over the next 2-6 years, I'd say the starting 9 and bench look pretty solid, now and for the next few years.

We've seen a noticeable increase in pitchers drafted and draft bonuses given to pitchers over everyday players. We even saw more IFA money going to pitchers than in our recent past. Delzine & Cordero got $850K in bonuses. I think that's more than all the IFA pitching bonuses paid the previous year, combined. In 2023, the top 7-8 pitchers signed made that much , combined. In 2022, the most we paid was $125K and the total was about $200K on all signed pitchers. The 2021 signing period, we spent close to $850K on the top 3 pitchers signed, which was close.

I like what Brez is doing. I'm not sure Cora would do better. I'm no where near as high on Cora as I was after 2018, but I still like him as our manager, and I blame JH and the GMs for our failures after 2018 way, way, way more than I blame Cora. (That's not to say Cora is blameless.)

Wins is not all I judge a GM on, but W-L are what’s most important. Getting into the postseason is what’s most important. Brez was pretty proud of himself at the trade deadline last year on the moves he made last year, but it actually made the team worse. I don’t care what the team looks like beyond this year at the moment just like I didn’t care what the team looked like down the road in 2022, 2023, and 2024 when the Red Sox didn’t make the postseason let alone be a winning ball club. I’m not as big a fan of Cora as a manager as most of on here, and I certainly don’t have any kind of excitement of the thought of Cora moving upstairs.

6 minutes ago, Bellhorn04 said:

I still think Cora is a very good in-game manager.  I think the things that have really started to raise questions are the team's sloppiness and/or listlessness.  We've seen the team battle back from deficits several times in the last two series so that's a positive sign.  But they need to get on a run.  Flipping and flopping around the .500 mark is getting old.  

 

Yes, but this is the 4th year in a row the club has played like this.

29 minutes ago, Old Red said:

Wins is not all I judge a GM on, but W-L are what’s most important. Getting into the postseason is what’s most important. Brez was pretty proud of himself at the trade deadline last year on the moves he made last year, but it actually made the team worse. I don’t care what the team looks like beyond this year at the moment just like I didn’t care what the team looked like down the road in 2022, 2023, and 2024 when the Red Sox didn’t make the postseason let alone be a winning ball club. I’m not as big a fan of Cora as a manager as most of on here, and I certainly don’t have any kind of excitement of the thought of Cora moving upstairs.

I should not have said "all you judge GMs by," I was wrong.

On the trade deadline moves, last year. I think we all thought they were half-hearted moves (or worse,) but I will say that Luis Garcia and Lucas Sims were not bad RP'ers, but they both sucked worse than what we had before. This is an example where the GM gets blamed for the players doing way worse than what just about anyone would have expected.

There were better pitchers traded at the deadline, and all Brez gave up were players that either looked destines to be AAAA types or who were Rule 5 eligible and were borderline on wanting to protect or lose.

Lucas Sims had a very decent 2023 season with Cincy (3.107 ERA in 61 IP, but a very nice ,622 OPS Against and 1.18 WHIP) He had a 3.57 ERA to start 2024, but with BOS jumped to 6.43. Is that really Brez's fault? Yes, he could have given up more prospect capital for a better RP'er, but if Sims gave us 3.10 to 3.57, it would have been helpful.

Luis Garcia was an aging RP'er who had shown signs of decline in 2023, but still had a 4.07 ERA and a 3.71 ERA to start 2024 (1.17 WHIP.)  From '21 to '22, he had a 3.34 ERA and 1.13 WHIP) Nobody expected an 8.22 ERA with BOS. Like Sims, we could have/should have gotten better, but both underperformed, greatly. Brez deserves some blame, for sure, but these two imploded.

The Paxton deal was bad. He did not do real badly in his 3 GS, but we all knew he'd never last the season.

Gotta give Brez props for the winter moves that brought us Slaten (2.93 in 55 IP) and Weissert (3.13 in 63 IP.) The Criswell addition was the type of move I expected Bloom to make, every winter.

Not all of Brez's moves worked, like Chase Anderson, Bailey Horn, Joely, Rich Hill and few others who did not last long.

On O, the O'Neill trade was a big plus, but of course, the Grissom for Sale trade overshadowed everything else, combined. Bad GM'ing? Maybe. Bad luck? Maybe. 

8 hours ago, BaseballGuru said:

Look, at some.point we keep records and stats to look upon as a measure of results based performance.  The ONLY thing that matters and leads to change in results is know how.  It's time to face faces. The 2018 club required very little managerial prowess to manage.  That's a fact.  Outside of that Cora has failed to obtain a championship.  That's what the measuring stick needs to be...missing the playoffs 5 of the last 6 years is inexcusable.  AC's in game mgmt is just not what it needs to be.  PERIOD!  Leaving SPs in on multiple occasions to rack up 11 earned runs in under 3ip is grotesque and horrendous for the player.  Pitching to cleanup hitters with 1st base to give setting up a must have DP scenario or even just bypassing the competitions best hitter...all baseball 101...selection of which player for which scenario has been abysmal.  He just doesn't have it.  Boston won't ever seen something like 4 rings in 5 years or even back to back with Alex Cora if he ever had a second 2018 team again anyway.  You need a guy from NY to know how the Yankees did that...Hire me and I'll prove it by commission.  I get paid zero unless we make the playoffs and advance once there.  I've watched twice the baseball games AC has in life and all Redsox games for over 35 years.  The players are already there enough to win.  The selection and configuration is wrong and not maximized.  Just let me do it John Henry.  Room and Board until the playoffs.  Then you'll pay me when you get your hardware.  Put up or shut up I say... it's the only way.

While I certainly agree managers are hired to be fired, I would first remind you that Terry Francona was fired despite breaking the 86 year curse and winning a 2d WS 3 years later.  He later was successful as the Cleveland manager, and my guess is that, should the Sox fire Cora, he will be another team's manager pretty quickly.

The second thing is that the 2017 Sox, who won 93 games in the regular season, had a lower ERA than the 2018 Sox--and basically the same pitchers both seasons.  However, the hitting and scoring were much better, and I honestly think it was because DD brought in JDM, who seemed to me to have a magical effect on that lineup because just about everybody improved a lot from 2017 to 2018.  

Nevertheless, we have to give Cora a lot of credit because in 2016 and 2017 the Sox won 93 games both years and were eliminated in the ALDS both years.  With Cora they won 108 games in the regular season and won the ALDS 3 games to 1, the ALCS 4 to 1, and the WS 4-1.   And he did that despite the closer Kimbrel having a postseason ER of 5.91.  

The collapse in 2019 is easily explained:  the pitching collapse, going from an ERA of 3.73 to 4.70.  Chris Sale and David Price, both high-priced starters, had horrible years.  Meanwhile JH was again footing the bill for the highest payroll in MLB.  So he fired DD and brought in Chaim Bloom (CB) no doubt with instructions to somewhat follow the Rays system of low salaries and winning teams.  

However, the 2021 season was actually pretty good, especially from the managerial perspective.  The Sox finished 2d in the AL East with 92 wins, but still won the wild card game over the Yankees, the ALDS series against the 100 wins Rays, and finally lost, 2 games to 4, to the Astros.  And he did that without a closer, without Betts,  and without Sale, Price, Kimbrel or Porcello. That season confirmed how good Cora was and is.  2022 and 2023 were unsat because the personnel were--and I think the blame belongs to both Chaim Bloom and John Henry.

I think Breslow is a better fit, but I sure didn't like his hiring Giolito and dumping Sale (while paying his salary with the Braves).  Those two moves alone would explain the continuation of a .500 team last year and again this year.  Both seasons the Sox team ERA has been ranked 17th in MLB.