FORT MYERS, Fla. — The tone has been set. The Boston Red Sox gathered as a full team for the first time in 2023 on Monday, a day that began with meetings and speeches and plans for the year ahead.

Owner John Henry, Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom and Manager Alex Cora all set the expectations for the season, telling the players that the organization believes they can surprise people when the season begins next month.

“We’ve got to be better,” Cora said. “We finished last. We know it. But at the same time, it’s a different group. So one thing about the group, they really don’t care what happened here last year or the year before or 2018. They can care less about those guys, right? It’s a new season. There’s a lot of good things that are happening right now. We’re trying to connect, of course, in the clubhouse. Off the field, all that stuff. It’s going to take time but so far so good.”

Cora believes the new faces will spark a reboot for a franchise that has finished last in two of the last three seasons. He told me “professionalism” was the word he would use to describe the early days of this camp. And while he’s impressed by the newcomers, he also invited some of the most successful players to ever wear the uniform to be part of this.

Pedro Martinez was here on Monday keeping a close eye on young righty Brayan Bello, who threw from flat ground after being shut down for two days with forearm soreness. Dustin Pedroia spent the weekend in town talking to the team about what made him the heart and soul of this team for a decade.

“Whatever they need me to do,” said Pedroia, who was mentored by Cora as a player and is now paying it back by passing along his experience to Cora’s young players.

Jim Rice spoke to the group over the weekend, stressing the importance of putting the ball in play and moving runners along with productive outs when necessary. Rice, who was not known as a talkative guy as a player, told the players they need to handle media requests to take pressure off their teammates and Cora.

Jason Varitek, the game planning coordinator and catching coach for the team, spent time working with newly acquired catcher Jorge Alfaro, a late arrival to camp after dealing with visa problems. As a kid in Colombia, Alfaro watched a lot of Red Sox and Yankees games on TV and said it was a “dream come true” to work with Varitek.

It would be a dream come true to have Varitek, Rice, Martinez and Pedroia in uniform, in their prime now. In fact, Red Sox fans would be happy to have Chris Sale or Corey Kluber or James Paxton in his prime. But that’s not happening.

Instead, the legends are here to pass along their experience. So are the veterans, new and old, in uniform. Kiké Hernández told me it still feels weird to think of himself as one of the older players on the roster, and recalled a conversation he had with David Ortiz last year when Big Papi told him it was time to start being more vocal in the clubhouse, to share the knowledge he has built up from nearly 10 years in the big leagues to the younger players.

It’s been a while since those lessons were shared in Fort Myers. Last year’s lockout-shortened spring training was a three-week sprint. The year before no one was allowed in the clubhouse because of pandemic restrictions. Monday marked the first time the entire organization came together indoors in Florida since 2020.

“To have them around, to help out, it’s always good for us,” said Cora. “I know it’s good for them.”

Tom Caron is a studio host for the Red Sox broadcast on NESN. He is a graduate of Lewiston High School.

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