A few hours before the start of Game No. 162, Alex Cora was asked if he was eager to have such a hugely disappointing season behind him.
The question, it would seem, was already more than a little late.
"(Shoot), I've been thinking about next year for a while,'' said Cora. "A lot of watching, a lot of thinking, a lot of questions over the last month. The planning's in place from my end.''
Goodness knows, there's been precious little to celebrate about this one. A few young players -- Brayan Bello and Triston Casas -- enjoyed promising September performances. Some veterans performed to expectations, but not nearly enough.
As a team, the Red Sox have had a losing record since, ironically, Aug. 2 -- the day of the MLB trade deadline. Officially, the Red Sox weren't eliminated from the postseason until the second-to-last weekend of the season. But unofficially, they've been playing out the string for some time now.
As such, Cora sees no value in waiting until spring training to correct things. In recent weeks, Cora has talked often about monitoring the offseason workouts of his players more closely and, along with members of his coaching staff, paying them in-person visits.
But he always wants to see a change in attitude over the winter.
"One of the things I really want is a sense of urgency,'' he said before his team finished out the year with a 6-3 victory over the Rays. "It's something that, as an organization, we've done throughout the years and we have to push hard during the offseason. The message is going be, 'Now.' I love the future, we love the past. But I think living in the present and pushing hard is something we're going to talk a lot about. It's something that pushes you to be great.
"It's not that we didn't do it this year, but I think the message should be louder. We know where we're at, we know where we finished. I think we know where everybody is going to expect us to be next year, too, because of the division. We just have to be ready.''
Cora looks back at a season that saw the Red Sox have a quarter of their games (42) started by rookie starting pitchers, along with introducing a number of first-year position players (Casas, Connor Wong, Jarren Duran). The inability of the rookies to be competitive in many of those starts doomed the Red Sox, and a litany of injuries didn't help either.
"Yeah, we got younger, be we have to push,'' he said. "It's not an excuse. It's not an excuse in the AL East, it's not an excuse in the big leagues. I heard a lot about injuries and all that, but it doesn't matter. (The Rays) have been hurt the whole season, and they're in the playoffs. From top to bottom, regardless of who you are -- a $35 million player or a rookie who's coming here for a spot start. We expect to push. Think about today; don't think about tomorrow.
"Think about today; don't think about tomorrow. You have to win every day. If you have that mentality every day, good things are going to happen. I'm not saying we lacked that. But the excuses of injuries or being young and all that, is over. It's in the past. We learned a lot this year. I learned a lot as a manager. I'm going to attack the off-season the right way, sending the message: 'Hey, it really doesn't matter If you're a little bit banged up, we have to show up and we have to go because we expect a lot. Everybody expects a lot from this organization, and to be honest with you, we were a big disappointment.''
Typically, Cora identifies a player on the current roster whom he expects to improve next season. This year, that player is outfielder Alex Verdugo.
"Yeah, he hit for average,'' said Cora. "But he can be a lot better baserunning-wise, defensively...He's getting to that area in his career of who he's going to be. We talked about that with (Andrew Benintendi) a few years ago and you see the player he's become -- a better defender, a good hitter. I think Verdugo has a chance to hit for power, hit for average, but he can impact the game running the bases and playing defense.
"We're going to push him hard this offseason to get back to playing faster, to play quicker. Athletic-wise, he can do that. He's going to be in better shape going into spring training and we envision him to be an impactful player -- not only in the batter's box, but also, on the other side of the ball.''
Despite some lopsided losses in the final two weeks, Cora maintained that the team's preparation and effort was "on point.''
Still the notion that it's already time to return home does not sit well with Cora.
"To be there all the way to the end is a great feeling,'' he said of packing before the postseason even gets underway. "This one? I really hate it. I don't like it. But hey, we deserve to go home. Like I said before, we're going to push hard this offseason to get it right. We know we play in the toughest division in baseball. But at the same time, we should be a lot better than this. This feeling? It's not great and I'm going to use it as something to push me forward and be better.''
The Sox saw their home run power drop considerably this year, and that's an area that has to improve.
"You don't (want to) rely on power,'' he said. "But you need power in the lineup. We had the right guys here. When Trevor (Story) was here, he was hitting the ball out of the ballpark. Obviously, J.D. (Martinez) and Xander (Bogaerts) didn't have their usual (home run) numbers, but that (power) works at the big league level.''
Cora also praised the togetherness and professionalism of the players on the roster.
"We're the best worst team in baseball,'' he said. "That's how see it. How did this happen? And obviously, we know it happened. But you talk to the opposition, you talk to (Aaron Boone, Kevin Cash, Brandon Hyde) and everybody around and it's like, 'Man, it just didn't happen.' For x or y reasons. We didn't play well on the field for extended periods of time and we paid the price.
"But going back to the group, they've been awesome. They've been great.''