The knives are coming for Alex Cora. They always do whenever John Henry and FSG are involved in the departure of a major Red Sox figure. But the fact that Alex Cora has plenty of friends in the media and the game writ large will make the next few weeks extremely interesting as reports about the inner workings of the Red Sox filter out.
To start us off, we have former ESPN reporter and Over The Monster alum Joon Lee with a massive piece looking into the supposed dysfunction of Craig Breslow’s operation.
Among some of the most interesting details are that Craig Breslow’s inner circle of decision-makers has become extremely small, that Sam Kennedy is thought of by some in the front office as “toxically positive,” and that Craig Breslow’s methods are meeting resistance from some players: “A veteran member of the 2025 team described the club’s approach as ‘arrogant,’ arguing that the front office’s model-driven posture turns information into ironclad dogma. The handling of Bregman was a failure not just to read the market but also an ideological one, with the organization treating free agency like a transaction to be optimized, rather than a relationship to be managed. ‘It’s ‘Moneyball’ computer beep-boop nonsense,‘ the veteran player said.” (Joon Lee, Substack)
I don’t know whether Sam Kennedy is “toxically positive,” but positive certainly seems to be the right word to describe Alex Cora’s feelings upon being fired. At 4AM this morning Cora tweeted out “Happy!” with a smiley face emoji. Around the same time, he replied-all to Kennedy’s all-staff email announcing the changes, saying “The Cora’s will be OK,” and adding a winking face emoji. (Lauren Campbell, MassLive)
And, oh yeah, he’s also posting things like this on Instagram:
As you can see in the above, Jason Varitek is going out of his way to publicly position himself on the side of Alex Cora and in opposition to Breslow, despite the fact that he was offered a chance to stay with the organization in a different role. According to this behind the scenes look at how last night went down, Varitek is taking the news “particularly hard.” (Chris Cotillo, MassLive)
The consensus around the game seems to be that Alex Cora was far from the biggest problem for the Red Sox:
But even if it’s true that Alex Cora is one of the best managers in the game as many of his peers see him, moving forward could still be the right move. (Trevor Haas, Boston.com)
And while rival executives may be surprised, they shouldn’t be given FSG’s track record in the personnel department: “It’s an endless game of survivor at Fenway Park, only no one ever survives. Not top executives. Not superstars like Mookie Betts, Rafael Devers and Alex Bregman. Not managers like Terry Francona, John Farrell and now Alex Cora after the team’s 10-17 start.” (Ken Rosenthal, The Athletic)
