The Phillies announced Friday that they’ve hired Caleb Cotham as their new pitching coach, replacing the recently retired Bryan Price. Cotham was reported to be the front-runner last week.
It’s been a rapid ascent to this position for Cotham, who is still just 33 years of age and as recently as 2016 was pitching in the big leagues. He retired shortly thereafter and was quickly hired as an assistant pitching coach with one of his former teams, the Reds. Cotham’s extensive work with Driveline Baseball opened him up to myriad ways in which data and technology could be implemented as a means of improving velocity and optimizing pitching arsenals. When the Reds hired Driveline’s Kyle Boddy a year later in 2019, Cotham added “director of pitching” to his title with the Reds organization.
Despite his youth, Cotham’s growing knowledge of cutting-edge technological advancements in pitching development has made him something of a rising star on the coaching ranks. He reportedly interviewed with multiple clubs this winter. Cotham’s familiarity with Phillies skipper Joe Girardi, his manager with the 2015 Yankees, surely couldn’t have hurt his chances at landing the job in Philadelphia.
“Caleb has many strengths as a pitching coach that we believe will help him excel with our staff,” Girardi said in a statement within today’s press release. “He has a very good feel for evaluating pitchers and getting them back on track when things start to go wrong. The pitchers in Cincinnati were very complimentary of his game-planning ability and knowing how to play to each one of their strengths. Caleb is a tremendous competitor whose experience as both a major league pitcher and major league coach will enhance our staff.”
The loss of Cotham gives the Reds some work to do on their coaching staff. Boddy, the organization’s pitching coordinator and director of pitching initiatives, noted at the end of a congratulatory Twitter thread that he is “not throwing [his] hat into the ring” to replace Cotham. Boddy added that Cotham’s presence with the organization “helped to attract considerable coaching talent” from outside the organization and that the Reds have “a lot of great directions to investigate.”
Before Caleb Cotham retired he was a Pitcher for The Louisville Bats (Reds Triple-A)
I like the hire, but it doesn’t matter unless he sticks around. Phillies have more pitching coaches than playoff appearances in the last 5 years.
Every team in baseball has had more pitching coaches than the Phillies have had playoff appearances in the past 9 years.
Hah true. Fine. Phillies have had more pitching coaches in they last 3 years than they’ve had WS wins in their entire history.
Ugh even more depressing haha
Hey! Good for Caleb, I was hoping he’d get it. He is on Trevor Bauer’s channel ‘Momentum” a lot, and he seems like a good dude and a knowledgeable person all around. Hope he can be instrumental to any success they might have in the future.
I’m not saying that he’s young for the job, but I heard that he had to have his parents sign a permission slip before he could interview. 😉
Terrible hire. He was a bad pitcher who is far to young with limited experience. Makes you wonder how he knows Girardi.
Yeah, I mean Baur just had the best season of his career and won his (and the Reds) first Cy Young ever partly under his tutelage but you’re right, he has no idea what he’s doing.
Are you always a dumb ass?
Lots of amazing coaches, weren’t great players. Lots of great players were terrible coaches.
I just realized he is Joe’s boy. Garbage Hire. Like nola or wheeler will take advise from a crappy wannabe
Bauer did.
If he can convince Bauer Outage to come to the Fightin’s I am all for it!!!
please no
@DarkSide830 is all you ever do is sit on MLBTR just waiting for the next article!
I really like your comments and insight.
I’m with you here. If they’re going to overpay someone, let it be Realmuto. They don’t really need Bauer. I don’t expect them to get either.
The Phillies really needed something new with their pitching staff because last year it was disgusting to see. Maybe this will start a new beginning, but I really don’t see it happening. Sad!
Phils have some significant holes in their lineup..They finally scored runs in a steady manner…now, they will lose DD and most likely JT…That is a lot of offense suddenly out of the lineup..Kingery might never hit and Hoskins is so hot and cold..mostly cold..
No GM and front office seems rudderless..As a Phan, my confidence level is not high…convince me otherwise…PLEASE