Say this much about the Saturday afternoon massacre that cost Boston Red Sox head coach Alex Cora and five coaches their jobs: it provided a world of free press for the Four Seasons Baltimore hotel and COACHES4HIRE LLC transportation service.
The housecleaning on the Patapsco River came immediately after Boston beat Baltimore, 17-1 at Camden Yards. Chief Baseball Office Craig Breslow, team president Sam Kennedy, and Red Sox owner John Henry flew into Baltimore after the Orioles’ 10-3 win on Friday.
Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com was on site at the team hotel (and snapped the viral photo of the aptly-named coach that removed Cora and his staffers from the premises). He reported that Cora delivered “a two-word, somewhat-nebulous text to multiple reporters” who reached out to him — ‘”I’m happy” — while Henry “did not acknowledge a reporter standing outside the hotel and went into the lobby.”
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Breslow and Kennedy are expected to address the media Saturday in a press conference.
Cora’ firing was a surprise for several reasons. They just won by a lopsided 17-1 score. The season is early, with 134 games left on the schedule and eight games separating first and fifth in the American Leage East. At 10-17, Boston’s record is not even the worst in the American League (the Astros are 10-18).
Cora has spent his entire managerial career (1,161 games) in Boston. He survived the taint of his role in the Houston Astros’ 2017-18 cheating scandal, when he was the team’s bench coach. After being suspended for one season (2020), he reclaimed his job from Ron Roenicke once the suspension ended.
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The Red Sox won 108 games and a World Series in Cora’s first year as manager. That was with a very different roster than the one he was given to start the 2026 season. But his reputation hardly suffered, even as the Red Sox struggled to rebuild a winning roster after losing Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, and other core pieces.
Despite that, and despite his 620-541 record, Cora could not survive his team’s slow start to the 2026 season.