How Alex Cora's phone calls helped keep Nathan Eovaldi with Red Sox

Forget text messages or Twitch stream chats. Alex Cora used an old-school method to make his pitch to Nathan Eovaldi.

In his first press conference since signing a four-year, $68 million contract with the Boston Red Sox, Eovaldi revealed Cora called him by phone "four or five times" over the last few weeks as the right-hander debated where to sign in free agency.

One of those calls involved Cora telling Eovaldi how Red Sox fans went nuts over his postseason heroics at a recent screening of the team's World Series documentary at the Emerson Colonial Theatre in Boston.

"A.C. was talking to me on the phone about it," Eovaldi said Monday at the Major League Baseball Winter Meetings in Las Vegas. "And just to hear the reaction from the fans everything I was able to do in the postseason when I was traded over, it makes me super excited to be able to come back and join the Red Sox and be here for another four years."

Cora also employed what proved to be an effective tactic: Discussing Eovaldi's offseason training regimen with the assumption the 28-year-old was re-signing in Boston.

"I mean, he was kind of acting like I was already part of the team still,” Eovaldi said of Cora. “I appreciate that because it keeps my mind right, knowing if I come back, the plan is already set in motion."

Eovaldi did have several other suitors in free agency. But the Red Sox had a leg up based on the veteran's positive experience in Boston from July to November, and Cora made sure to drive that point home.

"The relationship that I had over there (in Boston) and all that I experienced that I gained, I feel like as a player, you have the love and support from your teammates, not only them but from the fans," Eovaldi added. "And I felt like I was able to achieve that last year with the postseason run.

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"I wanted to come back and experience that again, hopefully be a part of it this year and win another World Series."

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