Boston Red Sox
“Stuff like that can unite people.”
David Ortiz’s speech just five days after the Boston Marathon bombing resonated with a grieving city. Photo by Jim Rogash/Getty Images
April 20, 2026 | 12:24 PM
3 minutes to read
Alex Cora is no stranger to Marathon Monday in Boston.
Between his playing career and his extended tenure as Red Sox manager, Cora has spent 11 years waking up early and heading to Fenway Park for an 11:10 a.m. first pitch on the third Monday in April.
”It’s a great day, to be honest with you,” Cora said Monday of the Red Sox’ annual morning start amid the festivities of the Boston Marathon. “A lot of energy from the [time] you get up. Streets are packed. People are drinking — coffee — early, and everybody’s excited. It’s a special day for all of us, and we enjoy it.”
Cora, who ran the 2025 New York Marathon, has a newfound appreciation for the thousands who make the grueling trek from Hopkinton to Boylston Street. For Cora, Marathon Monday stands as a testament to the sports culture ingrained within Boston, community, and the human spirit.
“The other day, I ran the Boston 5k and at mile two, I was like, ‘How in the world did I run that thing?’ But it was a cool experience,” Cora said of running a marathon last year. “You look around and the people that run, it motivates you. It gets you going.
“There’s a lot of different stories behind every runner, right? You’ve got the elite ones. They’re going to do what they do. They’re going to sprint for 26.2 [miles], but the rest of us kind of like, there’s a reason we’re running that day, and just looking around like — Wow, this person is doing this. How? Everybody has a motive and a story behind it, it’s pretty cool.”
The Red Sox — who don special jerseys that say “BOSTON” across the front every Marathon Monday — are also intertwined with the tragedy of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.
Monday marks the 13th anniversary of David Ortiz’s famous “This is our F****** City” speech at Fenway Park — a rallying cry to a hurting community just five days after the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.
“All right. All right, Boston,’’ Ortiz said in a pregame address to the crowd. “This jersey that we wear today, it doesn’t say Red Sox, it says Boston. We want to thank you, Mayor Menino, Governor Patrick, and the whole police department, for the great job they did this past week.”
“This is our F****** city, and nobody is gonna dictate our freedom. Stay strong. Thank you.”
The 2013 Red Sox — a club few expected to be a competitive club come October — went on an improbable run en route to a World Series title in October. Jonny Gomes, a key cog on that roster, delivered the first pitch ahead of Monday’s game.
“[Craig Breslow] was talking about how special that team was,” Cora said of the 2013 Red Sox, adding: “… Nobody thought they were going to do it, but it kind of pushed them more, and they got everybody united in the city. At the moment, it was kind of like, Oh, [expletive], what is this, right? This is the world that we live in. … Stuff like that can unite people.”
“I lived it before, in [2017] back home [with Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico]. That was unreal. … And today is a special day for a lot of things, but just to see those [Marathon Bombing survivors] on the field [Monday] is a reminder that you cannot take it for granted. … It’s just a reminder that you’ve got to live the life the way you want to, and don’t take it for granted, because you never know what the future holds.”
Conor Ryan is a staff writer covering the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox for Boston.com, a role he has held since 2023.
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