By spring training, you can find projections for just about every possible outcome of the baseball season. Who's going to win the American League East? Who's going to hit the most home runs? What will Rafael Devers' on-base percentage be?
The projections may be flawed; just ask a Royals organization that outperformed them consistently during their run to the pennant in 2014 and the World Series in 2015. But there's a consensus range of outcomes deemed reasonable, [...]
By spring training, you can find projections for just about every possible outcome of the baseball season. Who's going to win the American League East? Who's going to hit the most home runs? What will Rafael Devers' on-base percentage be?
The projections may be flawed; just ask a Royals organization that outperformed them consistently during their run to the pennant in 2014 and the World Series in 2015. But there's a consensus range of outcomes deemed reasonable, if not quite reliable.
(By the way, most projections say the Yankees will win the A.L. East, Giancarlo Stanton will hit the most home runs and about .338 for Devers' on-base percentage.)
There is, however, at least one position the analytical community can't really project at this point: What does a new manager mean for a team?
The Red Sox are banking on Alex Cora to take them to another level — beyond the back-to-back division championships they won under John Farrell and beyond the Division Series, where they've lost each of the last two years.
"Personally, my expectations are as high as [those of] the fan base," Cora said. "The expectations of myself, the staff, the organization from top to bottom are the same. So you have to embrace that. That’s the way I see it. I don’t see it as an obstacle as most of the people see it. I see it as something challenging, but it’s fun. It’s fun to be part of this environment."
In picking Cora to succeed Farrell, the Red Sox believe in the 42-year-old's ability to be a better liaison between the front office and the clubhouse — to connect more and communicate better with a new, younger generation of major-leaguers. The day he was introduced at Fenway Park, Dave Dombrowski called him "contemporary."
Because what Boston wants Cora to do is extract the best possible outcome from his players — to get them to play at the highest end of their projections as possible.
"We talk about putting them in a position to be successful on the field. That’s a big part of what we’re trying to do over here," he said.
A big part of that is making his players as comfortable as he can in the clubhouse. Early in spring training, Mookie Betts mentioned "tension" in the locker room last season. Xander Bogaerts said the team "had a lot of stuff going on last year, to be honest."
As much as anyone else, Cora knows how that "stuff" can spiral — how the focus can be taken off the hours between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. when the game's actually happening.
The players have said their conversations with the manager have been brief and casual. Cora has emphasized getting to know them beyond what they do at the ballpark.
"It's not always about baseball, and I think that's good," said David Price.
"You have to connect with them and learn about their families and learn about them off the field and that makes it a more fulfilling experience," Cora said. "You're human beings, and if you only concentrate on baseball, it becomes a grind. It becomes a long season.
"I learned from the guys that I've talked to what kind of players they are, what gets them going, the way they act mentally. It seems like in every conversation there was something they feel we need to adjust, and they feel this is good for this organization."
At the same time, Cora doesn't enter preaching campfire ditties as a panacea to whatever prevented Boston from fulfilling its potential a season ago. He has some analytical ideas, too. He wants his team to shift more defensively, including some creative looks in the outfield. He wants his hitters to be more aggressive early in the count instead of waiting for a perfect pitch that may never come later. He thinks much of what he learned in Houston as a coach for the champion Astros, who beat the Red Sox on the way to the World Series, can be applied to this squad, too.
"He’s able to communicate very well, and what makes him a great commodity is he’s not too far out of the game. He’s played with some of my teammates," Jackie Bradley Jr. said. "That’s good that he's able to adapt — a little old-school and new-school.
"He looks like he’s ready to take the reins."