The Boston Red Sox may have already parted ways with chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom before the end of the 2023 season, but will not be a full-on house cleaning for club this offseason.

Not if Red Sox manager Alex Cora is telling the truth when it comes to his future with the club, anyway.

Holding court with the media before Wednesday’s home finale at Fenway Park, Cora outright said, “I’ll be here next year” when the subject of his future came up. When asked to clarify, Cora repeated the line, and noted he’s “good.”

For what it’s worth, it’s the closest thing to a definitive answer anybody in the media has heard thus far when it comes to Cora’s future following yet another last-place finish for Boston. But it stands to reason that Cora is not exactly speaking out of turn here, especially when you consider the confident tone behind his answers to those questions.

• Perhaps Cora’s future with the club shouldn’t be in question at all.

  After all, the Red Sox did pick up his option for 2023 and 2024 way back in 2021.But that, of course, was a decision made by — or at the very least had the blessing of — a man who’s since been ousted from his post, so it was fair to wonder if that was indeed still the case.

  Cora has also shown that he has the ability to guide a team to postseason success, as he helped lead the Red Sox to a World Series title in his first year on the job back in 2018, and helped take the Sox to the American League Championship Series in 2021.

• 

  Sep 4, 2023; St. Petersburg, Florida, USA; Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora (13) looks on from the dugout against the Tampa Bay Rays in the eighth inning at Tropicana Field. (Nathan Ray Seebeck/USA TODAY Sports)

• One interesting wrinkle here is whether or not Cora will return as the manager of the Red Sox or if he will transition into a front-office role with the club.

  There’s always been rumblings of Cora being interested in eventually moving from the dugout to the general manager’s box. Earlier this month, Cora said that being a general manager is “something that intrigues me.”

  And perhaps the Bloom disaster full of clear-and-obvious disagreements between the two in regards to how the roster was being constructed is reason enough for Cora to realize that he would officially prefer being a chief decision maker over having to constantly work with what’s been given to him.

• 

  Jul 28, 2023; San Francisco, California, USA; Red Sox manager Alex Cora runs back to the dugout after making a pitching change against the Giants during the sixth inning at Oracle Park. (D. Ross Cameron-USA TODAY Sports)

• In the days and week following Bloom’s dismissal, the Diamondbacks’ Mike Hazen has emerged as a name to watch when it comes to Boston’s vacant front-office post.

  Hazen getting the job would seemingly be good news for Cora, too, as Hazen worked under Dave Dombrowski, if there’s anything to be learned from the Dombrowski vs. Bloom era, it’s that’s the former’s approach is clearly the general manager approach that Cora wants to work under.

  Overall, the 47-year-old Cora has compiled a 438-368 record (.543 winning percentage) as Boston’s manager from 2018 through 2023, though Cora missed the 2020 season due to a suspension by MLB.

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