The Nationals announced on Thursday that they’ve hired longtime Cardinals pitching coach Derek Lilliquist to fill that same role on their staff under new manager Dave Martinez. The Nats also hired Tim Bogar, who was most recently the Mariners’ bench coach, as their new first base coach. The has also confirmed its previously reported hiring of Chip Hale (bench coach) and Kevin Long (hitting coach), and announced that Joe Dillon will be the new assistant hitting coach to Long. Bobby Henley is back with the team as the third base coach.
The 51-year-old Lilliquist was dismissed as the Cardinals’ pitching coach at season’s end. St. Louis ultimately chose to replace him with former Nats pitching coach Mike Maddux, meaning the two clubs have effectively swapped their 2016 pitching coaches. Lilliquist spent more than a decade and a half with the Cardinals organization, including the past six years as their pitching coach and the two years prior to that as the bullpen coach.
Bogar, also 51, joins the Nats after a long run in the American League West. A bench coach with the Rangers in 2014, Bogar joined the Angels’ front office as a special advisor in 2015 and jumped to the Mariners organization the following year when Jerry Dipoto (with whom he worked in Anaheim) was named GM in Seattle. With the Mariners, Bogar spent two seasons as the bench coach. He’ll bring another experienced coach to the staff as well as one that is quite familiar with analytics due to his close working relationship with Dipoto. He’s also coached on the Red Sox’ staff in the past.
The 42-year-old Dillon was the Nationals’ hitting coach with Triple-A Syracuse in 2014-15 but has spent the past two seasons as a minor league hitting coordinator in the division-rival Marlins organization.
Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic first tweeted the news that Bogar had been hired. Chelsea Janes of the Washington Post first reported Lilliquist had been hired (also via Twitter).
Good luck to my former UGA classmate in Washington (except against the Braves of course).
So basically the Cardinals and Nationals traded pitching coaches. Wonderful.
They both have their strengths but I’ll take maddux fo sho.
Aww Lilliquist was basically invisible during game time. Seemed pretty lazy then past few years.
Lilliquist will do fine the first year. Scherzer
Wasn’t Bogar considered to be a big managerial prospect 4 of 5 years ago?
He was a couple years ago. Lost out on the manager opportunity with the Rangers, which came down to the wire.
You left out one team with two advantages: the Padres who are in Southern California where Stanton would prefer to play, and have the pitching prospects the Marlins would want.
I suspect much of the press thinks of San Diego as a “small” market, but a metro area of 3.4 million isn’t small, especially when the team has drawn 2 million-plus 21 of the last 22 years, including 15 years with a losing record.
The Padres own a piece of their ballpark, have a decent TV deal, and ownership that spent $50 million on international players AND paid $37 million in penalties, in addition to nearly $13 million in the 2016 June draft.
Owners willing to spend nearly $100 million to rebuild their farm in one fell swoop should be taken seriously. With a slew of young players making the minimum, they could easily afford to take on ALL of Stanton’s contract.
All valid points, but you left out the most important factor. Stanton has no desire to go to a rebuilding team.
Why is this comment in a thread about the Nationals hiring some coaches? Looks more like Stanton trade related.
I know this is a serious commenting space, but does anyone else think of this scene when reading Derek Lilliquist’s name:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRWMGjXuyVo
good luck with that, cardinals pitching staff was utilized well.
If you think running Rosenthal, Segrist into the ground the last few years while other guys went a week without getting up. Wacha and Reyes pushed too hard. Maness overused probably so much his career is over. A lot of that is Matheny. But I never recall seeing a positive result after a Lilliquist mound visit. Yadi was the defacto pitching coach. Albeit I was spoiled with years of Dave Duncan. I think the biggest benefit for cards pitchers is having oquendo back on the staff. A team that stresses generating ground balls needs better infield defence. I’m hoping for a vast improvement by Wong. It seems he could be a really good defensive 2nd baseman if coached up.
Wong had a pretty good year overall. If he can build on that we’re in good shape.
Cards will be much better overall and have better defense