The Boston Red Sox raised plenty of eyebrows Friday morning with their decision to designate Hanley Ramirez for assignment.
Given how the Red Sox have used Ramirez all season and especially of late as he was struggling — he was still playing regularly — it was assumed the decision came, as most personnel decisions do, from the front office. In this case, that means it would have been president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski’s call.
However, Dombrowski said Friday afternoon at a press conference that the decision actually was made — or suggested — by manager Alex Cora.
“We were prepared to maybe go in a different direction with our move. (Cora) called me around 11:30 (Thursday) morning,” Dombrowski explained at Fenway Park. “I was about to go for a run, and Alex goes ‘I’ve got a thought for you about what we’re doing,’ and he said, ‘This is a move I would like to make.'”
According to Dombrowski, Cora wanted to start playing Mitch Moreland at first base more often. In order to do that, Ramirez’s role would have been reduced, and Cora expressed skepticism about Ramirez’s ability to handle that role.
“He said, ‘I really want to play Mitch Moreland more. He’s a good player. He’s played very well for us. I don’t think Hanley is a person that (handles sitting on the bench) well. It gives us an opportunity to keep Blake Swihart and be in a position for Blake to get more playing time,'” Dombrowski recalled. “So he said, ‘This is something I recommend us doing.’ I said, ‘You sure?’ He said, yep, and he went through some different reasons behind it.
“What I asked him to do at that point was to go to the ballpark — he gets there earlier than me — meet with his coaching staff and be in a position where that’s really what he wanted to do.”
