Alex Cora has experienced a lot of firsts in his debut season as a Major League Baseball manager, but the Boston Red Sox skipper has yet to get sent to the showers early by an umpire.
Cora only has argued twice so far this season, neither resulting in an ejection. After video surfaced of former New York Mets manager Terry Collins exploding on an umpire during a 2016 game against the Los Angeles Dodgers, Cora was asked about his approach to arguing with umpires Thursday on WEEI’s “Dale & Keefe.”
“I don’t know, I haven’t been out there too much,” Cora said. “I’ve been out there twice. Once in the no-hitter against the A’s on that play at first base that we didn’t agree with. I went out there for that one and got the explanation, and I just said very politely, “if he’s not throwing a no-hitter you don’t change the call but it is what it is.’ And the other one was the obstruction call in Houston. I remember I told the umpire, ‘you’re penalizing (Rafael Devers) because he finished the play when (Alex Bregman) stopped play.’
“I try to act cool,” Cora continued. “I don’t know. We’ll see when it happens, you know, I might drop my Spanish in there, use my Spanglish to my advantage and see how it goes.”
That’s a solid plan.
Perhaps Cora can take some notes from ace Chris Sale who was rung up after finishing his outing in Wednesday’s win over the Baltimore Orioles. Sale had an issue with the strike zone and let the home plate umpire hear about it before being tossed from the game.
