Alex Cora doesn’t hand out compliments like this. On September 6, the Red Sox manager called Aroldis Chapman ‘one of the best I’ve ever managed — genuine, transparent and accountable’, according to a tweet from @SwingCompletoBB. The catch, if you want to call it that, is that Chapman’s 2026 numbers don’t exactly match that billing: a .692 OPS and an xwOBA in the 10th percentile across all of MLB. So what is Cora seeing that Statcast isn’t capturing?
The praise nobody saw coming in September
Chapman heads into the final stretch of the season with an offensive line that doesn’t turn heads: .235 AVG, .324 OBP, .692 OPS. Those aren’t ‘one of the best’ numbers. Those are numbers from a hitter who has been a tough fit to keep in the lineup consistently.
And yet Cora said it without hesitation. ‘Few are like him,’ the manager added, per the @SwingCompletoBB post published September 6. The comment wasn’t a reaction to a home run or a hot streak — it was a character evaluation, not a production review.
What Statcast says vs. what Cora is measuring
According to Baseball Savant, Chapman is averaging 88.2 mph exit velocity this season — 33rd percentile in MLB, well below what you’d expect from a power hitter. His xwOBA of .286 puts him in the 10th percentile: the quality of his contact ranks among the lowest in the big leagues.
That doesn’t mean he brings nothing to the table. Some numbers do hold up:
- 42 RBI in 84 games — he’s been opportunistic when it counts
- BB% in the 66th percentile — he knows when not to swing
- Sprint speed in the 68th percentile — still an active presence on the bases
But none of those figures quite justify praise that sweeping. What Cora is almost certainly measuring is something that never shows up on any dashboard: how a player carries himself when things go wrong, how he walks back into the dugout after a strikeout, how he talks to the young pitchers. That’s not a small thing. A clubhouse that’s trying to win in September needs exactly that.
Why it matters when a manager says it out loud
End-of-season manager praise is usually boilerplate. This doesn’t feel like it. Cora chose specific words — ‘consistency, determination and commitment’ — that don’t describe a hot hitter. They describe someone who holds the atmosphere of a team together across 162 games.
For Chapman, coming off a difficult season at the plate, that public statement carries real weight. It signals to the winter market — and to his own teammates — that there’s value in him beyond what the box score shows. In baseball, that currency is real.
If his September numbers improve, the full narrative comes together. If they don’t, Cora has already made clear that his read on Chapman doesn’t start and end with the stats. Both readings can be true at the same time: Statcast measures what it measures, and the manager has been watching something different from the dugout for months.
