Alex Cora, Red Sox Relished In Manny Machado Making Final World Series Out

The Boston Red Sox are World Series champions, and their manager isn’t pulling any punches.

A defiant Alex Cora admitted Wednesday what everyone assumed: The Red Sox’s World Series triumph over the Dodgers was made that much sweeter by the guy who made the final out for Los Angeles.

That is, shortstop Manny Machado.

While recounting the final inning of the championship-clinching Game 5 to NESN’s Tom Caron prior to Boston’s World Series victory parade, Cora said he took particular delight in watching Chris Sale strike out Machado swinging.

“And then, the guy we’ve been waiting (for) the whole season,” Cora told Caron, as seen in the video above. “And I turned around to (Red Sox bench coach) Ron Roenicke and I said, ‘We’ve been waiting for this guy the whole season.’ ”

Why was Machado the subject of Cora’s schadenfreude? In case you forgot, the All-Star shortstop put the whole Red Sox organization on blast last season while with the Baltimore Orioles, after an incident that began with his dirty slide that injured Dustin Pedroia in 2017. He also spiked Steve Pearce at first base in Game 4, so yeah, he’s not viewed too favorably around these parts.

Boston certainly got the last laugh, though — most notably Cora, who also told the haters to “suck on it” in an awesome interview Wednesday.