The Yankees are making it pretty easy for Alex Cora to pitch.
The Red Sox manager continues to plead with his front office to bolster a team that is two games behind as the Yankees struggle to make a breakthrough.
Boston beat the Athletics, 12-9, on Tuesday night to move 10 games above .500 for the first time this season, while the Yankees continued their slump with a 5-3 loss to the Rays.
“We talked a few weeks ago about being greedy and we felt like we had a chance in the standings, but I think our chances are growing,” Cora said. According to MLB.com:.
“This is really a door and we can get this done. We’ll keep looking up, keep playing good baseball and see where it takes us.”
What once seemed like a laughing matter became reality, as the Yankees’ 6-17 record and Boston’s 18-7 losing streak combined to put the Bronx Bombers in Boston’s crosshairs.
The Yankees were up to 14 games behind the Red Sox on June 12, but that gap had narrowed to 3.5 games less than a month later.
Cora initially pleaded with the front office to be a buyer, not a seller, on June 26, when the Yankees’ slump began and they led the league with a 43-37 record.
“We’ll see what happens in a month, month and a half. We just have to continue to play better baseball,” Cora said at the time. From CBS Boston“Let’s be greedy.”
He added: “There are teams higher than us that aren’t playing good baseball. One of them will probably only be there for five days, but there are a lot of others. Let’s not be satisfied with the third wild card, let’s aim higher and see where the season takes us.”
Boston will compete with the Royals (49-43), who finish the first half of the season this weekend, for the third-place and final wild-card spot, but they are currently just 1.5 games behind fifth-seeded Minnesota and also closing in on the fourth-seeded Yankees.
That puts Boston in a position to make a bid, but owner John Henry has not been as aggressive as expected in recent years as Boston has fallen from baseball’s elite.
The Red Sox, under chief baseball officer Craig Breslow, like many other teams, may need to add another late-inning relief pitcher or two to bolster their bench and deepen their rotation.
