With how banged up the Red Sox (81-66) have been throughout the 2025 season, it’s completely fair to wonder if Alex Cora will prioritize rest and workload management over actually winning important ballgames down the home stretch of the season.
Barring an absolute meltdown over the next 15 games, Boston will be playing October baseball for the first time since 2021. That in and of itself should be exciting for baseball fans in New England.
But if this team can’t hold up health wise throughout the postseason, we may be looking at an offseason coming sooner than we all want it to at Fenway Park.
Alex Cora was asked pregame on Friday ahead of his team’s season opener with the Yankees (81-65) how he’ll handle this stretch run.
Here’s the full exchange:
Bobby Manning, CLNS: “Down the stretch here, you know, these are all playoff games, almost to some degree. How do you balance winning every game with managing workloads, pitches - you know, guys down the stretches?”
Alex Cora: “Yeah, you gotta be careful. One bad step can put you in a bad spot, you know? And it's not talking standing wise, it's talking about health. So just a lot of conversation with trainers, a lot of conversation with the players, and then we go from there.
“I think we are deeper pitching wise than obviously the last three years. We're in a good spot. We got our starters rolling this weekend, right? [Lucas Giolito], [Brayan] Bello and [Garrett] Crochet. Hopefully they go deep into the game, and then we can mix and match.”
BM: “Do you start treating these more like playoff games in September with how you manage guys?”
AC: “I think we've been - we try to win games, you know, that's the way to put it. And the game will dictate what we do. I think so far, the group has done an amazing job putting ourselves in this situation.”
It’s clear that Cora understands there’s a delicate balance to walk with less than three weeks to go in the regular season.
On one hand, three of their remaining five series are against the Yankees, Blue Jays (84-62) and Tigers (84-63) - all of which are currently ahead of them in the American League playoff picture, with one of those teams just 3 ½ games up for the AL East crown.
Series wins against all three of these teams could have massive implications for where and when Cora’s team will be playing baseball this fall. And with how well his team has played at home versus the road, logic tells you he’d want as much homefield advantage as he can get in October.
But with all the injuries to both their starting rotation and the regular starting nine, Cora’s margin for error with this roster is all but nonexistent. He cannot afford to lose any more pieces, and he can’t afford for any of those pieces to be dealing with lingering injuries, either.
It’s a high wire act, and we’ll get our first glimpse of it on Friday night under the brightest lights possible.
Red Sox. Yankees. Friday night. Fenway Park.
This is what it’s all about.
First pitch is set for 7:10, with Lucas Giolito (10-3, 3.38 ERA) taking the bump for Boston. Luis Gil (3-1, 3.31 ERA) gets the start for New York.
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