There's a specific kind of Red Sox misery that only Boston fans really understand, and we are deep in it again. The Cora Long Goodbye has dragged on long enough that even the loyalists who defended him through the lean years are running out of gas, and now the ex-manager is finally tipping his cap to the fanbase that stuck with him. The timing is, uh, not great. Because while Cora is doing his farewell lap, the actual baseball team is busy reminding everyone why a change was coming in the first place.
This is the part of a manager firing nobody really preps you for. The decision gets made, the news cycle eats it for a day, and then you still have to watch the guy stand in the dugout for whatever's left of the schedule while the team plays like it knows exactly what's coming. Every loss feels like a referendum, every quote feels like a eulogy, and the fanbase splits into the camp that wants him gone yesterday and the camp that thinks the front office is the actual problem. Spoiler: in Boston, both camps are usually right at the same time.
And the thing is, Cora isn't some random hire who flamed out. This is the guy who delivered a title in his first year and became one of the more beloved figures in the modern Sox dugout. Watching him do the thank-you tour while the team craters around him is the Boston sports experience distilled. You don't get clean endings here. You get long, weird, vibes-in-the-toilet ones.
So here we are. Cora's saying his thank-yous, the team's losing, the fans are restless, and the offseason is basically already underway in everyone's head even though there's still baseball left to play. The Long Goodbye is going to keep being long. Buckle up.