Red Sox: Alex Cora’s to do list for the 2018 season

The Red Sox found their manager, but there are still things that he could work on to make this Red Sox team reach its full potential. Here is the list.

It has been just over a month since Alex Cora was named the next manager of the Boston Red Sox. In that time, not much has been done, but soon it will be time for him to make some changes.

One could argue, and have a legit argument, that the Red Sox underachieved last year. Sure, winning the division title was amazing, but they still did not advance past the ALDS.

There were some serious issues with last years team, and the main one was that nobody lived up to expectations. Mookie Betts had a drop off-season from his near MVP year. Andrew Benintendi may have had the best season of anybody on the team, but he was only a rookie. Hanley Ramirez was a huge disappointment. Heck, even David Price could not stay healthy enough to have a good season.

The Sox let John Farrell go because he could not communicate with the young players, and he never reached the max potential of this young team. Cora, despite being a young coach, likely will not have a long leash when it comes to underachieving.

Cora will definitely make some changes next season, but we made a to-do list for him. These things are the top things he can do which would help make this Red Sox team tap into its potential.

None of these things involve free agents. The answers to these questions are all players that are in-house.

Let’s take a look at the first thing on his to-do list.

Alex Cora needs to monitor Chris Sale’s innings early on in the season.

There was no question that as the season carried on, Chris Sale became less effective.

If the Cy Young award was given out at the All-Star break, Sale may have been a unanimous winner.

But in August and September, and even in the postseason, Sale was clearly out of gas. His slider lost its tilt, and it suddenly became a meatball. There was no indication that he was hurt, but that it was just fatigue.

In the final two months of the regular season, Sale had an ERA just north of 4.00. The last two months were when he lost the Cy Young to Corey Kluber. One of the most concerning stats is that he gave up a total of nine home runs in the month of September, and had his lowest strikeout total of 44 in that month.

So the first thing on Cora’s list is to manage the innings of Sale very closely. Sure, the Red Sox got Sale to be the workhorse of the staff, but that does not mean he has to go eight innings in a game in May. It does not mean that much.

Sale threw in 214.1 innings last season, the second highest of his career. Unfortunately, some of those innings could have been saved because he was throwing in games that had already been decided.

In 2018, it is imperative that Cora keeps a close eye on Sale’s innings early in the season. If he keeps it low early on, that will give Sale a longer leash late in the season, which is they will need him most.

Alex Cora needs to commit to one position for Hanley Ramirez.

There is no way around it. Hanley Ramirez was a disappointment in 2017.

His average dropped 40+ points, his OPS dropped 100+ points, and he was down 50 RBI’s. Ramirez is in Boston to be the basher in the middle of the lineup, but at the end of the season last year he was hitting at the bottom of the order sometimes.

While Hanley played 108 games at DH, he still played 18 games at first. If he is going to play the field next season, that’s no problem. But the Red Sox need to commit to playing him at one position next season, barring an injury.

He may not be a gold glover at first, but he is certainly competent enough to play it every day. If the Red Sox strikeout in free agency, why not bring in somebody else to DH and allow Hanley to play first?

He plays so much better when he is fully engaged in the game, and what better way to get him engaged than by playing first base?

Whether he plays first base or DH’s does not matter. The Red Sox need him locked into one position, that way he can give that his full focus. Ramirez is too good of a player to be hitting in the .240’s for back-to-back seasons.

If he can have a little bit of stability in his role with the team next season, he could return to his 2016 form, which gave all Red Sox fans all sorts of excitement.

Be on the lookout for Hanley Ramirez to play one position all year-long.

Alex Cora needs to commit to Joe Kelly as the eighth inning man.

This right here may have cost the Red Sox their season this year.

In the eighth inning against the Astros, the Sox were up 3-2, and were on the brink of sending the series back to Houston for Game 5. But the Red Sox coaching staff, sans Farrell following his ejection, left Sale in the game for the eighth.

Sale was clearly laboring through the seventh, despite putting together a fairly solid relief outing. In the eighth, it all came apart. Sale gave up a home run to Alex Bregman to tie it, and then the Astros later took the lead in the inning.

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Had the Red Sox gone to their eighth-inning man, Addison Reed, he would have been fresh and ready to go. Reed would have gotten the three outs, then handed the ball to Craig Kimbrel for the ninth.

That could have changed the entire face of the 2017 postseason.

Assuming Reed does not return to the Red Sox, Cora should find one guy from the start for the eighth inning role. It was a revolving door in 2017. Joe Kelly, Matt Barnes, and Heath Hembree all tried in the eighth.

None was really successful, but Kelly was the best of the three. Kelly also struggled through injuries, which may have made things worse for him.

From Opening Day, if Reed does not return, the Red Sox should set Kelly as their set up man. This will give much-needed stability to the entire bullpen. Relief pitchers pitch so much better when they have stability, and this would be a simple fix for the bullpen.