Cora in line for major suspension?

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JimD

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I was thrilled when the Sox moved decisively two years ago to hire Cora, while also being perplexed that the Yankees moved slowly to make a change from Joe Girardi and missed out. Now, I'm wondering if Cashman & company had reason to think that Alex was not quite the catch we all thought he was.
 

patoaflac

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I was thrilled when the Sox moved decisively two years ago to hire Cora, while also being perplexed that the Yankees moved slowly to make a change from Joe Girardi and missed out. Now, I'm wondering if Cashman & company had reason to think that Alex was not quite the catch we all thought he was.
Maybe they’ll think that when they win a WS with Boone, if they do.
 

Rovin Romine

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Cora has managed to taint 2018 though his own efforts. By extension, everyone who had a great year in 2018 is going to be suspect.

In my book, that puts him in 100% douchebag territory. He's gonna be gone, and he should be.
 

Plympton91

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Hmmm. Here's another question:
Would I feel better about it if the signs had been figured out by a runner on 2nd instead of off the video replay screen?
Yes, because that would have been a human to human interaction.

I guarantee that teams using the video replay are using pattern recognition apps to do it.

I find this hilarious in that your 2nd and 3rd quoted items completely, irrefutably, contradict the 1st.
Exactly. What’s more likely

1) The bench coach ran a rogue operation that the manager knew about and disapproved of but didn’t stop it or report it to the GM.

2) The GM and Manager instructed the bench coach to run a rogue operation.

Occam’s Razor here folks.

A third option is that “the smartest man in baseball” TM came up with the scheme, told the GM and Manager about it, and they signed off but told him if they got caught he’d be the fall guy.

But it sure as hell is not option 1.
 

genoasalami

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Reading the full report, you really don't need to be a weatherman to see which way the wind is blowing with respect to Cora. He is completely and totally screwed.

"Witnesses consistently describe this new scheme as player-driven, and with the exception of Cora, non-player staff, including individuals in the video replay review room, had no involvement in the banging scheme. "

"Cora arranged for a video room technician to install a monitor displaying the center field camera feed immediately outside of the Astros’ dugout."

"Early in the season, Alex Cora, the Astros’ Bench Coach, began to call the replay review room on the replay phone to obtain the sign information."

"The Astros’ methods in 2017 and 2018 to decode and communicate to the batter an opposing Club’s signs were not an initiative that was planned or directed by the Club’s top baseball operations officials. Rather, the 2017 scheme in which players banged on a trash can was, with the exception of Cora, player-driven and player-executed. "

"Cora participated in both schemes, and through his active participation, implicitly condoned the players’ conduct. "

So, apart from the content of the report, the way it was written tells you pretty much everything you need to know. It goes out of its way to single out his role as a manager with active participation and the Commish just hammered two in management with only indirect knowledge and acquiescence.

He is really screwed.
Don't be shocked when he gets a lifetime ban. (potential of applying for reinstatement at some point down the road)
 

bosox188

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I was thrilled when the Sox moved decisively two years ago to hire Cora, while also being perplexed that the Yankees moved slowly to make a change from Joe Girardi and missed out. Now, I'm wondering if Cashman & company had reason to think that Alex was not quite the catch we all thought he was.
Feel like there's some hindsight bias being applied here. If the Yankees chose to pass on Cora because they knew something about what was going on in Houston and wanted to stay away from it, I doubt they'd have hired Beltran as a special advisor for this past season.

And there was an earlier post either in this thread or one of the other two asking how Henry and co. weren't given a "heads up" about Cora being involved in a sign stealing scheme with Houston. The answer might just be that two years ago, nobody was thinking of this as something worthy of warning future employers about. The level of scrutiny on this sort of thing was fairly low at the time, certainly nothing compared to today's events. Granted, the answer could also be that two years ago nobody outside of Houston personnel knew anything.
 

DeadlySplitter

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I didn't consider a computer could be doing the hard work of decoding. that makes it a bit worse for me, honestly
 

DJnVa

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Would the cops choose not to arrest a known bank robber because he moved to a new town and they wanted to see if he would continue his lawless ways?
That's not a great comparison. It's more like they've arrested some of the "bad guys" and are still investigating others for additional "crimes".
 

EricFeczko

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Yes, because that would have been a human to human interaction.

I guarantee that teams using the video replay are using pattern recognition apps to do it.



Exactly. What’s more likely

1) The bench coach ran a rogue operation that the manager knew about and disapproved of but didn’t stop it or report it to the GM.

2) The GM and Manager instructed the bench coach to run a rogue operation.

Occam’s Razor here folks.

A third option is that “the smartest man in baseball” TM came up with the scheme, told the GM and Manager about it, and they signed off but told him if they got caught he’d be the fall guy.

But it sure as hell is not option 1.
Extending this logic further into a hypothetical situation: If the investigation finds evidence of rule-breaking by the red sox in 2018, it would be equally foolish to assume that Dave Dombrowski was unaware.

Though speculative right now, such information might drastically change how one perceives Dombrowski's firing, no?
 

nvalvo

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I'm in a pretty different place on this than most everyone else in the thread, so it may mean that I'm the oblivious one here. Time will tell.

I don't think Cora's suspension is going to be worse than Luhnow's and Hinch's. I think it will be on par, or maybe a bit less. I also don't think the Red Sox should fire him.

A few things have been obvious before the recent revelations.

1) The Astros were doing something boundary pushing with video. They had public job postings for people working on machine vision, and a lot of people figured out they were trying to use computers to pick up pitchers tipping.
2) Cora knew or suspected what it was, and had very likely been involved.

The whole tone of the 2018 ALCS postseason was that everyone thought everyone else was stealing signs. Taubman got busted photographing the Red Sox dugout. Cora said some cryptic things that suggested he knew more than he was letting on. I haven't checked the game threads, but I recall that we were all talking about it.

3) The Red Sox have been pushing the boundaries on sign stealing for awhile. Pedroia (injured, but in uniform) and Holt were implicated in 2017 — pre-Cora — in a scheme which also involved the training staff and Apple Watches.
4) But there has been a ton of boundary-pushing madness in the last decade of baseball. The St. Louis Cardinals hacked the Astros and stole player evaluations. The Phillies were accused of having a dude with binoculars stealing signs. The Yankees have been accused of various things at the edge of what's allowed. A bunch of players referenced in this thread already have suggested these sorts of schemes are widespread.
5) The Red Sox' allegations are arguably worse than the Yankees and Phillies allegations, but much closer to that cluster of offenses than what the Astros were doing.

So the recent revelations that the Athletic has dropped in these stories don't actually shift this picture for me all that much.

What I see when I look at this is that the Astros have a particularly bloodthirsty culture, well outside not only the black-letter rules but also the grey areas a bunch of organizations seem to be inhabiting. (Manfried also commented on this.) From where I sit, the technologically-enhanced efforts to do what you are already allowed to do — steal signs — aren't especially egregious. Eckersley basically does that on NESN. Communicating those signs via semaphore from the dugout to the batters box in realtime is total madness. Cora participated in that culture when he was there, likely quite actively. He was the bench coach, and this scheme seems like an obvious bench coach area of responsibility. The report is all — "Cora was the only non-player involved." That doesn't seem surprising to me at all, but mainly because the hitting coaches have other responsibilities with the Astros at bat.

But unless it becomes clear that the Red Sox did a lot more than they have been accused of, then it looks like Cora's arrival in Boston brought a defensive improvement that allowed us to actually pitch to Houston. After how 2017 ended, I would be shocked if that wasn't a huge part of why the FO wanted him; it wasn't hard to predict in the winter of 2017 that any path to a championship during our window would go through Houston. But the only thing that makes these recent allegations about Boston worse than the 2017 Apple Watch allegations is that the team had already been warned.

So I guess I don't see how Cora looks like such a villain here. It seems like the Astros continued to do Astro things both before and since his lone season in orange and blue. It also looks like the Red Sox continued on a trajectory set before his arrival. Maybe I'm reading this completely wrong, but I think the Commissioner wants to be sure there wasn't any additional malfeasance in Boston before he decides Cora's fate. (If there was yet-unknown malfeasance in Boston post-Cora, then all bets are off.) But I don't see any indication of that. In fact, if the Commissioners' office has been poking around and these latest revelations are all they found about Boston, I'd say that's a good sign for Cora. Most teams probably have comparable skeletons in the closet, and I'd guess the Commissioner's office is coming to realize that. I also think it would be easier to set a defensible quarantine boundary between the Astros and everyone else than it would between the Red Sox and Astros on the inside and everyone else on the outside, when many of those other teams are suspected to have done things substantively similar to the Red Sox, but not similar to the Astros.

If I'm Henry and Bloom, I keep Cora. I have Roenicke manage during his likely suspension — that's why you want an experienced manager as bench coach — but make as clear as possible that the Red Sox are getting out of the sign-stealing game for real. Let Cora say some contrite things about how he got carried away during a competitive arms race and crossed a line, that he accepts the suspension as a fair consequence of his actions, and that it won't happen again.
 

lexrageorge

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So why stop at Dombrowski at that logic..Face it. Cora has to go and will go. Start the search now for the new manager of the 2020 Boston Red Sox
I think we need some actual info (aka, not a media report) about what actually happened in the Sox dugout in 2018 and how Cora was involved before Cora gets fired or banned for good.

Firing Cora because of his involvement in the Houston fiasco seems wrong to me. Firing him because he was involved in something similar in the 2018 Red Sox would be justified; we just don't know that yet; that Athletic report has too many holes in it for me to be convinced it's 100% correct as written.

Not singling you out; there are multiple other posters saying Cora tainted the 2018 Red Sox.
 

DeadlySplitter

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Passan has sources saying Cora's punishment will be harsh. that's enough smoke for me to say the eventual report on us won't be too kind, but the door is open at least a bit.
 

Harry Hooper

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I'm in a pretty different place on this than most everyone else in the thread, so it may mean that I'm the oblivious one here. Time will tell.

I don't think Cora's suspension is going to be worse than Luhnow's and Hinch's. I think it will be on par, or maybe a bit less. I also don't think the Red Sox should fire him.

A few things have been obvious before the recent revelations.

1) The Astros were doing something boundary pushing with video. They had public job postings for people working on machine vision, and a lot of people figured out they were trying to use computers to pick up pitchers tipping.
2) Cora knew or suspected what it was, and had very likely been involved.
If the Astros were using machine learning to analyze video to discern "tells" in pitcher's deliveries, that does not appear to be against current MLB rules.
 

kartvelo

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That's not a great comparison. It's more like they've arrested some of the "bad guys" and are still investigating others for additional "crimes".
Yeah, I got the whole timeline wrong. For some reason I had it in my head that the trash can banging was discovered right after the Astros won the Series instead of just last fall, and that Cora had gotten a pass on that as not being The Boss at the time, which is why I wasn't getting the explanations offered by multiple posters.
 

jon abbey

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I was thrilled when the Sox moved decisively two years ago to hire Cora, while also being perplexed that the Yankees moved slowly to make a change from Joe Girardi and missed out. Now, I'm wondering if Cashman & company had reason to think that Alex was not quite the catch we all thought he was.
Just to add some specifics here, the Yankees won their ALDS series and Boston lost theirs and then signed Cora on October 23, maybe agreed to even earlier. NY lost game 7 of the ALCS to Cora and the Astros on October 21, and then Boston hired Cora before the WS even, very preemptive. Whatever Cashman knew or didn't know, he never had a chance at Cora.

Then it was after that that NY moved slowly, because no one else was really looking for a manager and so they could take their time. I would have hired Cora or Beltran or even Hensley Meulens over Boone in a second at the time, yet another reason I am glad Cashman makes those decisions and not me. Boone had a meh rookie season and even the start of 2019, but he seemed to figure something out around 200 games into his career and started to inspire much more confidence, I am pretty much a convert.
 

JimD

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I think we need some actual info (aka, not a media report) about what actually happened in the Sox dugout in 2018 and how Cora was involved before Cora gets fired or banned for good.

Firing Cora because of his involvement in the Houston fiasco seems wrong to me. Firing him because he was involved in something similar in the 2018 Red Sox would be justified; we just don't know that yet; that Athletic report has too many holes in it for me to be convinced it's 100% correct as written.

Not singling you out; there are multiple other posters saying Cora tainted the 2018 Red Sox.
Wasn't the 2018 scandal uncovered because several Red Sox players came forward? Unless The Athletic's reporting was totally off base, I can't see this ending well for Alex. And with Sox players involved, ownership should already have a pretty good idea of what was going on and how serious his involvement was.
 

PaSox

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Not singling you out; there are multiple other posters saying Cora tainted the 2018 Red Sox.

I'm not concerned about you singling me out and if you were to disagree I would appreciate the conversation going forward...My feeling is that Cora was in Houston, Houston got busted...Alex came here, someone (multiple sources) went off the record and said the Red Sox did the same...I think with a change in leadership the organization should be ahead of the story, wait for the facts to come out and act accordingly...With time not on their side, they are going to have to act quickly.
 

billneftleberg

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To add to this, MLB is on record that personnel were on hand during the 2018 postseason to ensure that the replay monitors weren't being used for nefarious purposes. So, there is no way the supposed sign-stealing scheme could have been taking place when the Sox rolled the Yankees, Astros and Dodgers en route to the championship.
you cant really say this, whose to say the Sox even make the playoffs if they werent cheating during the season, given that in 2019 with basically the same team didnt even qualify for the playoffs.

logically if Cora got away With something less than Kosher in houston, he would have no compunction not to bring it o his first managerial opportunity. so depending on the outcome of the investigation, the Entire 2018 season is under question
 

billneftleberg

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Suspensions and draft picks aside, seems to me the simplest solution to the electronic sign-stealing problem is to get rid of video replay review rooms. Make managers make review decisions based on what they see on the field and what players say.
L agree, as long as the temptation is there, someone will always try to gain an advantage. Standing on second and figuring out the signs on your own, is gamesmanship....anything else is cheating, no more no less.

and those passing the buck saying all teams do it are as bad as the Astros, because cheating is cheating
 

brs3

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It will be interesting to see what is uncovered in the final report regarding 2018. If the team is penalized by losing any draft picks, I'm not sure how you justify keeping Cora. If the league penalty is just from his Astros days, I could see some sort of thread to retain him...but it does not seem like it will be separated...and it shouldn't be if it's simply a different type of edge that the league has already determined is outside the bounds of the league rules. You cannot take a time machine back to remove the fun I had in 2018, so I'm not really all that broken up about it. If the Sox choose to dig in and support Cora against a crazy amount of evidence, that would be disappointing. Take the punishment, move on asap.
 

Max Power

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you cant really say this, whose to say the Sox even make the playoffs if they werent cheating during the season, given that in 2019 with basically the same team didnt even qualify for the playoffs.

logically if Cora got away With something less than Kosher in houston, he would have no compunction not to bring it o his first managerial opportunity. so depending on the outcome of the investigation, the Entire 2018 season is under question
The difference between the 2018 and 2019 teams was almost entirely starting pitching. That has nothing to do with sign stealing.
 

billneftleberg

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The difference between the 2018 and 2019 teams was almost entirely starting pitching. That has nothing to do with sign stealing.
disagree strongly

who was it who changed the pitchers regimen during spring training? cora right. So 2018 was definitely tainted. you can make all the excuses you want, but thats all they are. EXCUSES

the fact that around the Country, people see the City of Boston as a city of cheaters, isnt something We need, but sadly it is the perception

you may not care, but our children dont deserve the stigma
 
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StuckOnYouk

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disagree strongly

who was it who changed the pitchers regimen during spring training? cora right. So 2018 was definitely tainted. you can make all the excuses you want, but thats all they are. EXCUSES

the fact that around the Country, people see the City of Boston as a city of cheaters, isnt something We need, but sadly it is the perception

you may not care, but our children dont deserve the stigma
In the playoffs, the Sox went 11-3, including 6-1 on the road, when MLB started taking over video rooms. I feel fairly comfortable in saying the 2018 Boston Red Sox make the playoffs with or without a video replay room during the regular season.

And for what it's worth, they went 51-30 on the road. This wasn't a team that only won at home with their video system in place. They were a hell of a team and stepped up big time in the playoffs - both the hitters and pitchers.

Let's not overthink this.

As for Cora, I would hate to see him go. He has great relationships with the players, he knows the game. I know the suspension will likely be 1-2 years and at that point ownership may feel like the new guy already has found his place in the organization. But I'd like to hope that - as long as what's in the Athletic is the extent of it - they just hold off on firing him for now at least.

I wonder if the 3 guys who opened up to the Athletic have any regrets knowing that their contributions will likely knock Cora out of baseball for awhile.
 
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Minneapolis Millers

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disagree strongly

who was it who changed the pitchers regimen during spring training? cora right. So 2018 was definitely tainted. you can make all the excuses you want, but thats all they are. EXCUSES

the fact that around the Country, people see the City of Boston as a city of cheaters, isnt something We need, but sadly it is the perception

you may not care, but our children dont deserve the stigma
This post sucks for manifold reasons. Start with pitcher injuries. Cora‘s fault? Show your work. Otherwise, please stop with the histrionic “save the children” bullish!t.

Edit: Also StuckonYouk’s post.
 

Rovin Romine

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Cora has managed to taint 2018 though his own efforts. By extension, everyone who had a great year in 2018 is going to be suspect.

In my book, that puts him in 100% douchebag territory. He's gonna be gone, and he should be.
How does it taint Sale? Price? What Eovaldi did in the Series?
Don't make willfully stupid arguments - you're not an idiot.

2018 was a great offensive year for the Sox, with many fine individual performances, like Mookies', that weren't quite the same before or after.

Now, there's a very credible set of facts that suggest Cora was encouraging the team to cheat during 2018. The cheating was not done in a soft-gamesmanship like way which is part of the unwritten rules of the game, but in a way that expressly crossed a clear line, drawn to say, "You cannot use tech this way." The cheating expressly crossed that line - it in fact required an affirmative action on the part of the cheaters to cross the line. The cheating wasn't something that may or may not have had an impact. Stealing signs gives the batter a clear leg up.

I'd just like to enjoy a fucking cleanly-played won-or-lost game without wading though a bunch of extraneous crap. That extraneous crap is why I don't really follow football or cycling anymore. I'd rather not feel that way about baseball, and I certainly don't want to feel that way about one of the most recent, brightest performances of a club I grew up watching and rooting for. Fuck Cora.
 

JimD

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Really surprised and disappointed at the lack of action - I fully expected to wake up this morning to read that Cora was suspended at minimum, if not fired. They have just guaranteed that the Boston Red Sox will be front and center in another news cycle about baseball cheating, instead of conveniently using the Astros as cover by acting swiftly on Monday. Never mind the continued scorn and ridicule that will come their way if they have decided to keep Cora, suspensions be damned.

I tend to defend this ownership group out of general appreciation for the overall good job they've done in bringing four World Series trophies to Boston, but man, they can be really clueless at times. Chaim must be wondering right about now what he signed up for.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Really surprised and disappointed at the lack of action - I fully expected to wake up this morning to read that Cora was suspended at minimum, if not fired. They have just guaranteed that the Boston Red Sox will be front and center in another news cycle about baseball cheating, instead of conveniently using the Astros as cover by acting swiftly on Monday. Never mind the continued scorn and ridicule that will come their way if they have decided to keep Cora, suspensions be damned.

I tend to defend this ownership group out of general appreciation for the overall good job they've done in bringing four World Series trophies to Boston, but man, they can be really clueless at times. Chaim must be wondering right about now what he signed up for.
If MLB's investigation turns up nothing on the Red Sox front (not saying it will, just a hypothetical), would Henry and company still be justified in firing Cora? Point being, should the Red Sox hold Cora accountable for things that happened in Houston? MLB can certainly do that if they choose, but should the Red Sox? I don't believe so.

Let the MLB investigation run its course and go from there. I think you're deluded if you think firing Cora under the cover of the Astros news would deflect and dampen the level of scrutiny paid the Red Sox in this whole scandal. If the Pats are any indication, people are going to glom onto the "Red Sox are cheaters" thing no matter what happens. Whether they pre-emptively fire Cora, fire him after he's suspended, or if he and the organization are cleared entirely, there's no avoiding the news cycles.
 

Tyrone Biggums

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Really surprised and disappointed at the lack of action - I fully expected to wake up this morning to read that Cora was suspended at minimum, if not fired. They have just guaranteed that the Boston Red Sox will be front and center in another news cycle about baseball cheating, instead of conveniently using the Astros as cover by acting swiftly on Monday. Never mind the continued scorn and ridicule that will come their way if they have decided to keep Cora, suspensions be damned.

I tend to defend this ownership group out of general appreciation for the overall good job they've done in bringing four World Series trophies to Boston, but man, they can be really clueless at times. Chaim must be wondering right about now what he signed up for.
I woke up feeling the same way. But then I thought about it a little more. Being able to fire with cause might not exist if the ruling hasn't come down. Until an actual punishment is handed out all of this is speculation with regards to his time in Boston. I think they're waiting for the investigation to conclude and then they'll fire him with cause to avoid paying a buyout.
 

joe dokes

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you cant really say this, whose to say the Sox even make the playoffs if they werent cheating during the season, given that in 2019 with basically the same team didnt even qualify for the playoffs.

logically if Cora got away With something less than Kosher in houston, he would have no compunction not to bring it o his first managerial opportunity. so depending on the outcome of the investigation, the Entire 2018 season is under question
"Basically the same team" is, at best, misleading.
 

JimD

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I woke up feeling the same way. But then I thought about it a little more. Being able to fire with cause might not exist if the ruling hasn't come down. Until an actual punishment is handed out all of this is speculation with regards to his time in Boston. I think they're waiting for the investigation to conclude and then they'll fire him with cause to avoid paying a buyout.
There is certainly enough in Manfred's report to suspend Cora, though. That would still be feckless in my opinion but at least it would be something.
 

Tyrone Biggums

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There is certainly enough in Manfred's report to suspend Cora, though. That would still be feckless in my opinion but at least it would be something.
But there's nothing in there about the Red Sox. If Cora was still employed by the Astros then it would be different. No proof as of yet that he engaged in the same actions as manager of the Sox. I mean I'm 99.9% sure he did but the investigation needs to conclude first. Or I could be wrong and he gets shit canned today. We will see
 

JimD

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But there's nothing in there about the Red Sox. If Cora was still employed by the Astros then it would be different. No proof as of yet that he engaged in the same actions as manager of the Sox. I mean I'm 99.9% sure he did but the investigation needs to conclude first. Or I could be wrong and he gets shit canned today. We will see
Even discounting the 2018 allegations - if you owned a business and the general manager of your biggest and most prestigious division was found guilty of orchestrating a bribery scheme in 2017 while in their last job, would you keep him or her on?
 

Traut

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I mean really - I get firing him - but what's the urgency to do so yesterday?

Cora is certainly not managing another game for the Red Sox. Fortunately there's like 3 months between now and opening day.

There can be a lot of processes both legal, organizationally, and public relations wise that need to take place behind the scenes. Things that a well run franchise takes the time to consider and engage in.
 
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Shawn O'Leary

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Point being, should the Red Sox hold Cora accountable for things that happened in Houston?
Yes. Absolutely, yes. There are many fields that are under constant scrutiny; where people in positions of trust are held to a standard of avoiding even a hint of wrongdoing or impropriety (my own profession included). Is a baseball manager in such a category? Maybe, maybe not - but in my view a disqualifying set of actions coming to light is just that... disqualifying. Put another way, if I hire someone today and learn next year they mismanaged client money or had an improper relationship with a subordinate at their last employer, I'm firing them. And not to pollute the baseball board with politics, but I'm sick and tired of people accepting ludicrous behavior because of (political) laundry. Cora should be fired. It isn't a hard call and the front office is coming across like blockheads for not making this decision about 20 hours ago.
 

Average Reds

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Really surprised and disappointed at the lack of action - I fully expected to wake up this morning to read that Cora was suspended at minimum, if not fired. They have just guaranteed that the Boston Red Sox will be front and center in another news cycle about baseball cheating, instead of conveniently using the Astros as cover by acting swiftly on Monday. Never mind the continued scorn and ridicule that will come their way if they have decided to keep Cora, suspensions be damned.

I tend to defend this ownership group out of general appreciation for the overall good job they've done in bringing four World Series trophies to Boston, but man, they can be really clueless at times. Chaim must be wondering right about now what he signed up for.
Crane's actions yesterday seemed highly choreographed with Manfred's announcement. So my expectation is that Henry and co. will act in the same way, with any announcement coming on the day MLB penalties are handed down.

Nothing in that expectation prevents them from moving on effective immediately. (Meaning: begin the process of choosing the next manager and staff.) In fact, that's got to be the working assumption, because Cora is clearly a dead man walking.

Edit: Traut got there first.
 

mauf

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Even discounting the 2018 allegations - if you owned a business and the general manager of your biggest and most prestigious division was found guilty of orchestrating a bribery scheme in 2017 while in their last job, would you keep him or her on?
Reasonable opinion can differ as to whether the PR benefit of firing Cora prior to the conclusion of MLB’s investigation would be worth paying the remainder of his contract.
 

YTF

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If MLB's investigation turns up nothing on the Red Sox front (not saying it will, just a hypothetical), would Henry and company still be justified in firing Cora? Point being, should the Red Sox hold Cora accountable for things that happened in Houston? MLB can certainly do that if they choose, but should the Red Sox? I don't believe so.
I don't think it's a case of the Red Sox holding him accountable for what happened in Houston. In all likelihood MLB is going to take care of that and if that's the case he's probably lost for at least a year. But if anyone wants to see it as the Sox holding Cora accountable for what happened in Houston (and for now I'll overlook the pending 2018 investigation) why shouldn't they. If this came out before the Sox hired him might they of passed on him? Would firing him now be that much different? We have no idea how he represented himself during the hiring process and IF Cora's not the guy they thought he was would they not be justified in letting him go. A lot of supposing in this I know, but I think it's fair to consider.
 

Pablo's TB Lover

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Sep 10, 2017
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I am sure behind the scenes the ownership group is asking MLB to wrap it up sooner rather than later so everything can be choreographed and the door slammed shut on past violations. If this drags on through the next month we have talk radio and Twitter cycles filled with "Wow the Sox really done did some dirty stuff if MLB hasn't finished by now", and "MLB must be taking so long because they and the Sox are working together to destroy evidence of the violations (see NFL Spygate hot takes)"
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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Jan 23, 2009
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I don't think it's a case of the Red Sox holding him accountable for what happened in Houston. In all likelihood MLB is going to take care of that and if that's the case he's probably lost for at least a year. But if anyone wants to see it as the Sox holding Cora accountable for what happened in Houston (and for now I'll overlook the pending 2018 investigation) why shouldn't they. If this came out before the Sox hired him might they of passed on him? Would firing him now be that much different? We have no idea how he represented himself during the hiring process and IF Cora's not the guy they thought he was would they not be justified in letting him go. A lot of supposing in this I know, but I think it's fair to consider.
That's fair. Bottom line is we don't know what John Henry and company know. We also don't know when they learned whatever they know. I just don't agree with the reactionary "why haven't they fired him yet?" stuff. I'm not sure what is gained firing him today versus after MLB's investigations are concluded, particularly if it turns out that the "cheating" didn't carry over to Boston (again, I think it did but not on the scale that occurred in Houston).

I'm of a mind that there's a strong element of scapegoating Cora by the Astros. I have no doubt he was involved in the scheme in 2018 in Houston. I do have doubts that he masterminded the whole thing and they weren't doing it before he arrived and then once the evil genius moved on to Boston, they were back on the straight and narrow. It just seems too convenient to try to deflect blame from themselves by pointing the finger at a departed conspirator, especially if that conspirator went to a rival and beat them at their own game (allegedly).
 

Tyrone Biggums

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Aug 15, 2006
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Even discounting the 2018 allegations - if you owned a business and the general manager of your biggest and most prestigious division was found guilty of orchestrating a bribery scheme in 2017 while in their last job, would you keep him or her on?
Absolutely not. But I would assume there is legal red tape involved regarding things that happened before they took the job vs things that happened while they were there and the ability to recoup money.
 
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