BLOG: Dead Manager On Campus

There was the iconic image of Alex Cora walking across the overpass of the Mass Pike when he was first hired by the Red Sox in October 2017. Wearing aviator sunglasses, blue dress pants, white shirt, and a red tie with a blazer and his phone up to his ear, he was walking towards his new job inside Fenway Park with an "I'm the man" swagger.

Cora was supposed to be the savior for the Red Sox. A young Alex as supposed to come in and rejuvenate a Red Sox clubhouse that the veteran manager, John Farrell lost. The common conception after the 2017 season was Farrell was out of touch with young, upcoming Red Sox superstars and the younger, more energetic Cora would be the spark they need. And it was ... for 2018.

The managerial change worked. The Red Sox used their new energy to secure their ninth World Series in 2018 with a thrilling five-game series against the Dodgers. But after raising the banner and handing out rings on Opening Day, 2019 the partying was quickly died. The Sox performed poorly in 2019 and did not show the same life they exhibited a year prior. They were a boring team.

Red Sox nation was duped.

What we thought was "swagger" coming from Cora crossing the David Ortiz Bridge was, in 20/20 hindsight, cockiness. Cora was coming off a World Series championship with Houston and was flaunting it. But unbeknownst to everyone in baseball, Cora was hiding a secret. He was, believed to be, the mastermind behind the Astros and Red Sox use of technology to steal opponents' signs.

I for one was in a similar camp as Michael Holley when Cora first signed. Neither one us liked the hiring of Cora. While for Michael his problem was Cora's lack of managerial experience, my issue was abstract. I saw through that "swagger" he had while walking down Brookline Ave. That was not a Bill Belichick, seven rings type walk, that was the walk of a cocky, young 16-year-old who just got his driver's license and was handed the keys to a brand-new Mustang. No good can come from that.

But Sox fans loved it. Remember that image of him walking across the bridge, it quickly became a Gif that was circulating Twitter. And long-time Red Sox fanatic, moonlighting as a writer, Jared Carrabis was engrossed with Cora. In Carrabis' eyes and the eyes of many Sox fans, Cora could do no wrong and still can't.

The Red Sox will be making a mistake if they fire Alex Cora just because the Astros fired AJ Hinch: https://t.co/5M7AdWIvD0 pic.twitter.com/yFPEB1G6ND

— Jared Carrabis (@Jared_Carrabis) January 13, 2020

But I for one was not fooled by the Alex Cora mask. He made a mistake. We all make mistakes, bu this one, Alex is going to cost you. And it is going to cost you big.

BOOK OF THE WEEK: "The No Complaining Rule" by Jon Gordon

A new year and you would think this "book of the week" was done on purpose, well not quite. In 2019, I read a total of 26 books - that's pretty impressive from a person who hated reading in high school.

Over the past year I grew to love books and and reading. The last book I read in 2019 was fittingly finished on December 31 and is a great book to take into 2020. The No Complaining Rule.

Like many of Jon Gordon's books, this book too sets around a fictional story of a company facing the hardships of negativity - both inside the company and outside with bloggers. It was the task of the VP of HR, Hope, to figure out a solution to this problem. But here was the dilemma, things were not going very well for Hope in all facets of her life. Her husband had left her to raise their two kids on her own and her doctor found abnormalities in her blood work and wanted further testing done. It wasn't until the nurse at the hospital, Joyce - who is the sister of the bus driver, Joy, from The Energy Bus - pointed out her "no complaining rule."

The no complaining rule is strikingly similar to Jerry York's, 24-hour rule. At 74 years old, Coach York has lived by the 24-hour rule, both in hockey and in life. If anything bad happened, you had 24 hours to feel however you wanted to feel, but then it was time to move on. Conversely, if anything good happened, you also only had 24 hours to feel that emotion and then you had to move on. When you think about it, it's the only way to live.

Staying with the sport of the hockey. there was a part in the book that made me instinctively think back to the the 1996 third installment of The Mighty Ducks. New coach, Coach Orion, gave his team a life lesson about confidence and positivity. It's easy to be confident and stay positive when things are going your way and life is great. But it is incredibly difficult to keep that confidence and positivity when life has taken you on an alternative course.

Bad things will happen, but legendary Harvard women's basketball head coach Kathy Delaney-Smith put it best two months ago "failure is fuel for success." The failures that you experience today will eventually lead to success in the coming days.

Just keep going.