Red Sox’s Alex Cora Takes Blame For Defensive Miscues: ‘It’s On Me’

BOSTON -- The Red Sox certainly didn't perform like the team they envisioned themselves being when facing the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday, but Boston manager Alex Cora isn't placing the blame on anyone except himself.

Boston committed two costly errors, which snowballed into mini rallies from the Rays in the third and sixth innings, giving the best club in baseball all they needed to take a second straight victory over the Red Sox. The latest loss for Boston also served as the second in which the Red Sox made two errors, raising their 24-hour total to four.

"We gotta keep preaching good defense, we gotta coach them. At the end, it's on me, you know," Cora explained after the Rays defeated the Red Sox, 6-2, at Fenway Park. "I'm the manager of this club, and we've been sloppy. So, it's not about pointing fingers, right? The roster is the roster and we have to play better baseball. I'm the manager of this team and defensively we're not good."

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Masataka Yoshida made the first error, misplaying a routine hit to left field, which would've plated just one run for the Rays. However, Tampa Bay, as proven throughout all nine innings, capitalized on any opportunity that Boston provided. Then, déjà vu rolled around in the sixth inning when a regular single off the bat of Yandy Díaz turned into a Little League homer after Connor Wong airmailed an attempt from Díaz to stretch his base knock into a double.

"I've seen that play too many times the last two years," Cora said. "Gotta throw the ball to the right base, we gotta back up, we cannot become a spectator, right? You got places to go in every play in baseball. They had a great baseball play, (Manuel Margot) took off, groundball to second, and that happened. It's not good baseball."

This wasn't the first time Cora expressed his disapproval of Boston's lackluster defensive play, doing so less than a week ago after the Red Sox yet again made two costly errors in a loss, that time to the lowly Cincinnati Reds.

"At the end, we have to do it," Cora explained. "... I don't wanna sound pessimistic or negative but we have to do it. We can talk all the talk. We can say that we're better than this and all that, but in the end, we have to go out there and perform."