Jake MintzSenior writerSun, April 26, 2026 at 10:27 PM UTC·5 min readBALTIMORE — It was impossible to ignore the furry, neon-green, detached mascot head resting by itself, perched upright on the leather clubhouse sofa.
As Boston Red Sox players filtered in and out of the mostly empty, grim visiting locker room at Camden Yards on Sunday morning, the club’s “Wally” home run celebration totem acted as something of a comedic constant. Its fuzzy orange eyebrows raised, its pearl-white peepers three-quarters open, its enormous, empty mouth completely ajar in what can only be described as a look of surprise.
All the animate, sentient, decidedly less green beings around the Red Sox were similarly stunned.
That’s because Alex Cora, the club’s longtime manager, was fired on Saturday. Chief baseball officer Craig Breslow, team president Sam Kenndey and owner John Henry — none of whom had previously been on the club’s roadtrip — flew in from Boston to deliver the news. Five other members of Cora’s staff, including hitting coach Peter Fatse and gameplanning coach and franchise icon Jason Varitek, were also relieved of their duties.
The timing was blindsiding. Cora, resoundingly considered one of the game’s top skippers, was under contract through the 2027 season. Even though Boston had gotten off to a disappointing 10-17 start, few believed his job to be in immediate jeopardy.
Perhaps if the losing continued, the thinking went, Breslow would make a change come summertime. But an April firing?
Nobody — not Cora or his now-former players — saw that coming.
“It was a big shocker,” veteran reliever Garrett Whitlock said.
On Sunday, shock was indeed the prevailing sentiment among the players. Connelly Early and Garrett Crochet both referenced it. Whitlock said “shock,” “shocked” or “shocker” four times. Second-year star outfielder Roman Anthony got up to seven.
But Trevor Story, an 11-year veteran in his fifth season with Boston, was the player most outwardly peeved by the circumstances.
“They’re some of the best coaches in the world, and they care more than anybody, and just felt like they didn't get a fair shot,” he said of the jettisoned group.
Asked whether he was comfortable with the explanation provided by Breslow during a team meeting that morning, the 33-year-old shortstop answered resoundingly in the negative.
“There just has to be more conversations,” Story said. “I wouldn't say it was satisfactory.”
Kennedy and Breslow at the podium here in Baltimore pic.twitter.com/tHnn73QJAY
That not-so-veiled criticism contrasted sharply with the rosy, future-oriented outlook presented by Breslow and Kennedy during their news conference earlier in the morning. The pair — who, bizarrely, spoke in front of an Orioles-branded backdrop — were predictably skittish when it came to specifics, opting for optimistic platitudes and surface-level word salads.
“I don't think it's productive to get into the merits of an individual decision,” Breslow replied evasively when asked why he thought firing Cora was necessary. “We believe in the group of players that we have in the clubhouse down the hallway, and we believe that a new direction is warranted.”
Both framed the timing of the decision as a show of faith in the roster, arguing that providing new interim manager Chad Tracy with a longer runway gives the team a better chance to turn things around. Kennedy, meanwhile, put the responsibility for Cora’s firing squarely on Breslow’s shoulders.
“Craig leads our baseball operation, and he's made several bold decisions and recommendations, and this is one of them, and we fully support it,” he said. “That's why we took the action we took yesterday.”
I asked Sam Kennedy whether it was fair to characterize the decision to fire Alex Cora as Craig Breslow led.“Absolutely”
Conspicuously absent from the proceedings was principal owner John Henry. The 76-year-old businessman, who has run the Red Sox since 2001, was the subject of “SELL THE TEAM” and “F*** JOHN HENRY” chants outside Fenway Park just last week, following the club’s series loss to the New York Yankees. While Henry was present at Camden Yards on Sunday — he was spotted on an elevator — he did not address the media or the team.