Phillies Reportedly Offered Managerial Job to Alex Cora

The Philadelphia Phillies made a major move when it was announced that they were firing manager Rob Thomson.

At the helm of the team since taking over for Joe Girardi 51 games into the 2022 campaign, Thomson had a ton of success with the Phillies. Alas, he was never able to help the team get over the hump and win a World Series.

Despite plenty of regular-season success, the run Philadelphia went on in 2022 was the best they did in October. Their stay in the postseason got shorter and shorter every year; couple that with a painfully slow start this year, and it is easy to see why he was fired.

Taking over on an interim basis for the Phillies is Don Mattingly. However, he wasn’t the team’s first choice to take over for Thomson. That distinction would fall upon Alex Cora.

Phillies wanted Alex Cora as manager

Sep 7, 2025; Phoenix, Arizona, USA; Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field. | Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

Cora, along with a few other members of the Boston Red Sox coaching staff, was fired days before Thomson after a 17-1 victory over the Baltimore Orioles. He is who Philadelphia decision makers wanted to become the team’s next manager.

According to Bob Nightengale of USA Today Sports, the Phillies offered the job to Cora, but he declined. He has decided that he wants to spend some time with his family after being the manager of the Red Sox since 2018, outside of the 2020 campaign.

While Cora didn’t accept the job for now, he will be someone to keep an eye on when Philadelphia starts looking for its new full-time manager. It is easy to connect the dots given the working relationship that exists between him and Dave Dombrowski.

The current president of baseball operations of the Phillies held the same title with Boston from 2015 to 2019. The first two years of Cora’s tenure as their manager, including the 2018 World Series, overlapped with Dombrowski.

Alex Cora was offered the Philadelphia Phillies' managerial job before Don Mattingly, but declined.
He has decided to spend time with his family.
— Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) April 28, 2026

Bringing in a manager with championship experience would certainly be seen as a positive for Philadelphia. A veteran-laden team, they are most certainly in win-now mode.

Their entire starting lineup and starting rotation outside of center fielder Justin Crawford and right-handed pitcher Andrew Painter, two of the team’s top prospects playing their rookie campaigns, are 28 years of age or older.

Bringing in a manager who has the tools to help get a team over the hump, such as Cora, would make the most sense. That is, unless drastic changes are made ahead of the MLB trade deadline this year and this upcoming winter, that reshape the franchise’s core and a retool or rebuild is embarked on.

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