Alex Cora continues to pressure front office to make impact moves at trade deadline

If anyone believes in the 2024 Boston Red Sox, it's Alex Cora. The skipper has gone from hinting at his thoughts on the Sox's trade deadline approach to saying them outright: he thinks Boston should buy.

The Red Sox's stellar June play doesn't seem like a fluke. They've clawed their way up the division and wild card standings and sit just two games behind the once-dominant Yankees in the loss column.

“We talked about being greedy a few weeks ago, we saw a window (in the standings), but I think the window is getting bigger,” Cora said. “It’s actually a door and we can actually accomplish this. We’re going to keep looking up there and keep playing good baseball and let’s see where it takes us.”

Boston's front office has been typically vague about its deadline approach, but chief baseball officer Craig Breslow recently said that it'll choose either a "buy" or "sell" approach — not a hybrid model — as many reporters theorized. Cora is urging the men in charge to hop into the "buy" camp.

The front office's indecision leaves fans, and seemingly Cora, far from optimistic about its deadline decisions. The Red Sox didn't make any impact additions this past offseason because management is waiting for top prospects to be their salvation. But with the desperate, big-spending Yankees and the under-new-ownership Orioles fighting for playoff spots in the same division, waiting around isn't going to cut it.

Managers shouldn't have to beg their club's ownership to do the right thing. The front office got exactly what it wanted out of this Sox team — Andrew Bailey has improved the pitching, their young players (particularly rookies) are thriving, and Rafael Devers is playing the best baseball of his career in the first year of his long-term extension.

Alex Cora pleads with Red Sox front office to buy at the trade deadline

This Boston team can go places. Cora sees it, but the front office seems to be practicing willful ignorance. Anything could happen between now and the July 30 deadline, but going in with an optimistic approach to deviate from the doomsday vision of the previous months might do them well.

The version of the Red Sox Cora has been managing for the past month and a half deserves investment. They deserve help. The players have worked for it, and Cora has earned it.

The time to invest is now. It would show fans and Cora, whose contract is expiring, true commitment to the team and to winning. Red Sox players and management only have high praise for Cora as a manager, and giving him and his squad help before the deadline may be the determining factor that keeps him in a Red Sox uniform in the seasons to come.

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