It's not too often you see a baseball team win by double digits and have its manager fired just hours later. But that's exactly what happened with the Boston Red Sox and longtime manager Alex Cora.
Understandably, the Red Sox players were not happy with the decision to make that change.
With Boston off to a 10-17 start to the season and already falling eight games behind in the AL East standings, chief baseball officer Craig Breslow made the decision to fire Cora and five members of the coaching staff.
After the move was made, Breslow had a meeting with the Red Sox clubhouse. And it evidently didn't go well, according to Red Sox players. We often hear players keep these conversations in house. But on Sunday, several players voiced their frustration with the decision and overall message to the team.
Veteran shortstop Trevor Story called Cora and others who were fired “some of the best coaches in the world,” and said he “felt like they didn’t get a fair shot.”
He also said the message and explanation from Breslow were not satisfactory and that he needed to talk to Breslow “today.” Story said he wished the clubhouse had been consulted first, but that’s “not the nature of the business.”
“If this shows us anything,” Story said, “it’s we’re here to play baseball, and that’s it. We don’t make decisions. We don’t have any input on that.”
Garrett Whitlock also had something similar to say about the meeting:
“They made it very clear that we get paid to play baseball, and we need to just focus on playing baseball. … So that’s where we’re at.”
An anonymous player had some even stronger words to say.
The optics around the move weren't great as well. It came after a big win, and the coaches were driven off in an ironically named van. The decision was likely already made before the team even arrived in Baltimore.
Cora was in his eighth season as Red Sox manager and coached them to a World Series title in 2018.
This article originally appeared on For The Win: Red Sox players spoke out about front office after Alex Cora's firing