If you were tuning in Tuesday to get apologies from Alex Cora, your cup runneth over.
"I don’t want to get into details about what happened in ’17 but it’s a tough lesson," the sort-of-new Red Sox manager said. "Like I said, all I can do right now is apologize and get better and move forward. I’m not proud of what happened. I said it a few times already today, I did say it during the summer, one of the things that you do as a leader is to put these guys in situations to be successful. The way I did it, that we did it, with that group over there, it wasn’t the right way. For that, I’m going to say it today. I’m going to say it tomorrow. I’m going to say it the rest of my life, I’m sorry."
If you wanted to know why Cora didn’t have the guys bang the trash cans in 2018 after leaving Houston, you got that.
"I didn’t feel like we needed to do something like that, honestly," Cora said. "I know people will not believe me in that sense, you know, why not bring it here. It was that effective. I don’t know, I just decided, in that offseason to not bring it here. We had some conversations actually in spring training about a lot of stuff, from BOH (Brian O'Halloran) to Dave (Dombrowski) to the people that were around, I think at that point, people were starting to talk about what was going on around the league. It wasn’t worth it. It wasn’t worth it. But also, there’s an article out there and there’s a guy out there that decided to take a step and say what happened over there, and I paid the price. The way I can put it, it’s like, I decided, no, we don’t need to do that. The organization was very loud and clear about the whole sign stealing stuff and what happened before with the organization and other organizations, and they walked me through it. And in the meetings in spring training, with MLB, when I talked to them, it was like, wow, I better not even try to do something like that. That’s the way I can put it."
And if you wanted to Chaim Bloom to make it abundantly clear ownership was not force-feeding Cora on him ... you're welcome.
“In talking about this, and I’ve seen some of the stuff out there, I’m not sure anybody is going to believe me, but I’ll tell you the truth anyway: I think first and foremost, it was important that they play a role," Bloom noted. "They are responsible for the entire organization. And I respect, there’s a lot of different opinions out there on Alex and what he did and what that should be mean for any organization that would think about employing him, and it’s obviously important, since they’re responsible for the organization, for me to know how they felt, and to understand if it was something that baseball operations saw fit to do, that it was something they would support. Obviously, if that were not the case, it would have been obiously a very different process. So, not only do I think that was appropriate, I think it was necessary really to know how they felt. And they also made sure that I know if I or baseball ops felt differently, that was OK too. But I think that’s important just given how big this decision was for the organization, and how the people who are responsible for the organization would feel. But from that point on, obviously we kept them looped in on who we were interviewing, what stage of the process we were at, but they were emphatic that it was very important that this be a baseball operations decision and they would fully back whatever decision we came to."
OK. Now that we've got that out of the way ...
Make no mistake about, plenty of these narratives aren't going away. There are a couple of books coming out, along with a documentary, and when they do the conversation will kick back up.
If there are ever fans in the stands, Cora will have to avert his eyes to signs and put the earmuffs on, fending off the verbal slings and arrows Yankees fans and others have already put in their heckling holsters.
But, there is a way to douse the flames that come with Cora's last couple of years: Win.
The press conference was handled by Cora about as well as anyone could expected. He looked good. ("I started running like Forrest Gump," he explained when asked about his fitness routine back in Puerto Rico.) He sounded on-point. And before, during and after the Red Sox were awash with something they haven't really gotten much at all since that press release announcing Cora's departure -- positive publicity.
OK. But that was all well and good. But after the introductory GIFs and sound bites pushed to the side, the only true opportunity to actually put all of that dark-cloud controversy in the rear-view is to win. That's how it works.
You're mad at Tuukka Rask for leaving his team? You won't be if he wins 10 in a row. Bill Belichick is condescending in his press conferences? If he wins who cares? Kyrie Irving is a little off. Not if he drops 50 points.
For those thinking the uphill battle Cora is facing has to do with the remnants of those Astros days are missing the point. His challenge is to actually find a way to make this roster competitive again. If it is, all will be forgiven. If it isn't, all the apologies in the world won't completely put out the fire.
It's why some of the most interesting answers Tuesday (for me, anyway) was about how Cora actually was going to go about fixing the 2020 mess he watched from afar.
He talked about how athleticism has become more important than ever, feeling the 2019 edition got away from it a bit. He discussed the team's starting pitching conundrum. There was the analysis of various individuals such as Rafael Devers and J.D. Martinez, what went wrong and how it might be fixed.
And then there was the most popular question for all baseball managers these days: Would you have taken out Blake Snell like Kevin Cash did?
"I have to make decisions based on the information provided and the preparation before games," he said. "We had that conversation about that game everyone is talking about. Chaim went over it. It’s amazing the way people think and the way he thinks, the way I think. There’s a game that’s not black and white in that sense. There’s no right or wrong. What you think is right, I might think is wrong. You manage a game all of a sudden it happens because you think that way. It’s great. For me, I might think it’s wrong and go against you. It might work for me. That’s the way the game is. The way I see it, it’s a partnership. They’ll provide information and I’ll manage the dugout, the clubhouse and the game. Hopefully we can be successful."
When Cora was hired the first time it was about managing David Price and revamping hitting approaches. A little bit better here or there was going to get him plenty of atta-boys. This time? The game is different. The team is different. And the stakes are certainly different.
The Red Sox and Cora have one day of momentum, something that hasn't been the case for either since early 2019 turned into 2020. Now it's on to Day 2.
"As far as me, as a person becoming a manager again, I think patience is better than the last few years," he said. "To deal with everything going on worldwide and be a Dad and be a pre-K teacher and dealing with daughter’s situation as far as college and being in webinars and zoom calls and all that, it was a great teaching moment for me professionally. I think i’m going to be more patient in certain ways and for good or bad it was because I was home. I hope I can take what I learned from the job this year with the family and use it the right way here with the Red Sox."
