Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora gestures from the dugout before a game earlier this season. Nick Wass/Associated

MIAMI — All 162 games in a Major League Baseball season theoretically count the same.

But those who follow the sport closely know that the games directly preceding the annual trade deadline can take on increased importance for certain teams on the bubble who are attempting to choose between buying and selling. For the Red Sox, the 21 games remaining before July 30 certainly fall in that boat.

But instead of using a potential deadline push for his team, Manager Alex Cora isn’t using the allure of adding talent to rile up his players as the calendar turns from June to July. If the Red Sox play well, he believes, the rest will take care of itself.

“We’re not winning games to put pressure on the front office. We’re trying to win games to make it to the playoffs,” Cora said during a conversation at loanDepot Park in Miami on Tuesday. “There’s this idea that we have to put pressure on them. No… we want to win because we want to win. Whatever happens in three weeks or a month is gonna happen. Our goal is to win each series, to win every game. That hasn’t changed. It just happens that now people are going to start talking about it because it’s July.”

After winning two in a row, the Red Sox enter Wednesday six games above .500 at 45-39 and just a half-game behind the Royals for the third and final wild-card spot in the American League. Cora, at the midway point over the weekend, declared that the club is markedly better than people thought. A couple good weeks could lead to Chief Baseball Officer Craig Breslow trying to reinforce his club for the stretch run, with one source identifying starting pitching as the most pressing area of need if the Red Sox do buy. A slump could lead to veterans like Kenley Jansen, Chris Martin, Tyler O’Neill and Nick Pivetta being shipped out.

The Red Sox, stuck in deadline purgatory for the third straight season, are in control of their destiny. A record of 15-10 in June put them in position to have a conversation about potentially buying despite the industry believing, for most of the first half, that they were hellbent on selling. As one of five teams within five games of each other in the wild-card race, the Sox find themselves squarely in the AL’s vast middle. But Cora thinks there’s more for which to strive. He made headlines last week by talking about the Sox “getting greedy” in the coming weeks – a challenge he says was to his players and not Breslow or ownership in relation to the deadline.

“I think people took it the wrong way like I was putting pressure on somebody else,” he said. “Nope. I’m trying to get this group to understand we’re good enough to be better. We showed it in the month of June and hopefully we can do it in July.

“The greedy part is challenging this group to keep going. Like, ‘Don’t settle because we’re in the hunt for a playoff spot.’ No. Just keep pushing, keep pushing. If we do it as a group, you’ll never know what can happen.”

This year’s deadline will be Cora’s sixth as Boston’s manager. His team has bought aggressively twice (2018, 2021), largely stood pat twice (2019, 2023) and awkwardly tried to toe the buy/sell line once, in 2022, when Chaim Bloom reshuffled the roster by trading away Christian Vázquez while adding Tommy Pham, Eric Hosmer and Reese McGuire in a series of moves that both failed to work and caused significant clubhouse consternation. Veterans like Xander Bogaerts were unhappy about those decisions then, and Bloom’s 2023 deadline didn’t go over very well, either. By making just a couple of minor moves and labeling the Red Sox “as underdogs” in a postdeadline press conference, he angered some in the clubhouse. Cora and others downplayed the appearance of “Underdog” T-shirts in late August, but a clear message was being sent and Bloom wasn’t in on the joke.

This time around, no matter what Breslow chooses to do, Cora believes that things will be different, in part because he has a younger team that simply doesn’t know any better.

“No more excuses or complaining because of this or that,” Cora said. “We’ve just got to continue to play baseball.”

Now working under his third baseball operations chief, Cora said he has learned a lot in the nine months he has worked with Breslow, who was briefly his teammate in Boston in 2006. Cora said he has been impressed with how structured and bright Breslow is, as well as how well he understands clubhouse dynamics as a former player. The communication with players and the staff has been “great,” according to Cora, but the idea that Breslow is more likely to reinforce his club because of his playing experience isn’t a theory the manager buys into.

“One thing doesn’t have to do with this one,” Cora said. “Chaim had his ideas about the organization and where we were and we had to respect that. Guys were more open because they were veterans. Obviously, some relationships from the ’22 team, that happened. One thing I’ve learned from the last two (deadlines) is that we have to do a better job of continuing to play, regardless.”

Cora’s future with the Red Sox continues to be a storyline that quietly looms over the entire operation. The overwhelming belief in industry circles is that he won’t return, instead hitting managerial free agency and finding a lucrative deal with a team willing to pay him a big contract. Notably, Cora has gone out of his way to stay neutral when describing his future, refusing to acknowledge that he’s even open to a return to Boston or that he wants to come back. The only detail Cora has conceded in the past few months is that he’s not going to discuss an extension during the season.

“I’m open to showing up every day and keep working. That’s my goal,” Cora said. “I’ve said I don’t want to talk about the future. I won’t talk about the future. Whenever we get there, we get there.

“I know where we’re at. I know the situation. Honestly, the only thing I’m trying to do is put this team in the position to make it to the playoffs. I know that if we get there, it’s gonna be fun. But first thing’s first, we’ve got to get there … It’s going to take care of itself when the season is over.”

Still, it’s clear to anyone around Cora, who lost weight and changed some lifestyle habits over the winter after feeling run down both mentally and physically over the last few years, that the manager is rejuvenated this season. That feeling is less about how the Red Sox are playing, Cora said, and more about making sure he’s putting himself in a position to succeed by doing things like running every morning.

“I made a choice in my life to clean it up a little bit and it’s paying off,” he said. “I still come to the ballpark every day, and in the past, too, to win every single game, but at the same time, now I understand that’s not possible. I think understanding what I need to do now to lead the life and not suffer with the ups and downs of the season, I learned that the last two years. I’m in a better spot than in the past.”

There’s a legitimate chance Cora is managing elsewhere in 2025, meaning he won’t benefit from some of the long-term development the Red Sox are experiencing with some of their young players this season. But he has made it no secret that he’s enjoying the young, athletic team he has.

“All the moving parts and the athleticism, it brings a different element to the equation … They’re not afraid to go out there and make mistakes, which is the fun part,” Cora said. “We’re playing without fear and it has been good for us.”