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Phillies Pitching Coach Bryan Price Retires

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The Phillies announced that pitching coach Bryan Price has elected to retire. It’s a surprising development, as the longtime big league coach just signed with Philadelphia one season ago.

Price, 58, was in-demand at this time last year. He reportedly spurned pitching coach offers from the Diamondbacks and Padres to take the same position with the Phillies. 2020 marked Price’s 15th season as a major league pitching coach, as he previously served in that capacity with the Mariners, Diamondbacks and Reds.

Of course, Price is more famous for his time as Cincinnati’s manager. He skippered the Reds from 2014-18. That wasn’t a particularly successful stint, as the club managed just a 279-387 record in that span, failing to reach the postseason. Nevertheless, Price remained well-regarded in the industry, as evidenced by the number of opportunities available to him last offseason.

Philadelphia manager Joe Girardi will now hunt for a new voice to lead the pitching staff. Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola present an enviable top two starters with whom to work. Zach Eflin seemingly turned a corner in his age-26 season and Spencer Howard is one of the sport’s most talented prospects.

That said, the Phillies will certainly have some work to do in the coming months. Howard struggled as a rookie, while Jake Arrieta and Vince Velasquez continued to underperform at the back of the rotation. The bullpen was atrocious, contributing to Philadelphia getting left out of the 2020 expanded playoff bracket. Price’s replacement will work on building up depth behind that strong core. As Meghan Montemurro of the Athletic observes (via Twitter), that person will be the Phillies’ fourth pitching coach in as many years.

Phillies Hire Bryan Price As Pitching Coach

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10:32am: The Phillies have formally announced the hiring.

9:22am: The Phillies have made a key hire for the staff of incoming manager Joe Girardi. As expected, the team will bring on Bryan Price as pitching coach, per Matt Gelb of The Athletic (via Twitter). He’s said to have turned down offers to serve as the pitching coach with the Diamondbacks and with the Padres this month, instead opting for the Philadelphia opportunity.

Price, 57, served as the Reds manager from 2014 until his firing early in the 2018 campaign. Before that, he had a lengthy history as a pitching coach, including stints with the Mariners (2000-06), Diamondbacks (2007-09), and Reds (2010-13). He’s the first major addition to incoming manager Joe Girardi’s new-look pitching staff, and the Phillies can now shift their attention to find a replacement for interim hitting coach Charlie Manuel.

Bryan Price Favorite To Become Phillies’ Pitching Coach

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OCT. 30: Price is indeed the favorite for the position, reports Matt Breen of the Philadelphia Inquirer. Rothschild is still in the mix, Breen adds, but Price is believed to be the front-runner.

OCT. 29: Former Reds manager Bryan Price is a legitimate candidate to become the Phillies’ pitching coach, Jim Salisbury and Corey Seidman of NBC Sports Philadelphia report. New manager Joe Girardi revealed Monday the Phillies have already conducted “a couple of interviews” with pitching coach hopefuls, though it’s unclear if they’ve spoken with Price.

A Price hiring for the Phillies may not be imminent, but it’s worth noting he just rejected the Diamondbacks’ interest in him for their pitching coach position. Price has talked to the Red Sox in regards to their vacancy, meanwhile, but it looks as though they’ll select Dave Bush over him.

If the Phillies truly do want to hire Price, it appears the stars are aligning for that to happen. However, the Phillies could still consider other candidates – perhaps including Larry Rothschild – per Salisbury and Seidman. Rothschild came available Monday after a long run as the pitching coach for the Yankees, originally joining the team when Girardi, then New York’s manager, hired him in 2011.

The 57-year-old Price would bring extensive experience to Girardi’s staff in Philly. Before managing Cincinnati from 2014-18, Price held pitching coach roles for the Mariners (2000-06), D-backs (2007-09) and Reds (2010-13). Whether the Phillies choose Price or someone else, that individual will be taking over a pitching staff that failed in 2019 on account of a combination of subpar performances and injuries. As a result of their woes this season, the deep-pocketed Phillies seem likely to focus on giving their next pitching coach more to work with in 2020 than the ousted Chris Young had at his disposal this year.

Bryan Price, Kirk Saarloos Each Decline To Become Diamondbacks Pitching Coach

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8:41pm: The D-Backs also struck out when they offered the gig to TCU pitching coach Kirk Saarloos, according to Zach Buchanan of The Athletic (via Twitter). Saarloos, a seven-year MLB veteran, will evidently stay on for a seventh year at Texas Christian.

7:34am: Former Reds manager Bryan Price turned down an offer at a second stint as the Diamondbacks’ pitching coach, Zach Buchanan of The Athletic reports (via Twitter). The 57-year-old Price managed the Reds from 2014-18 and spent the 14 previous seasons as a pitching coach in Seattle (2000-06), Arizona (2007-09) and Cincinnati (2010-13).

That Price even took the interview obviously suggests that he’s open to coaching again, though it’s possible he’s holding out hope of landing a role with a different organization or simply didn’t feel that a return to Arizona was the right fit after sitting down with the current regime. In addition to the D-backs, the Red Sox are also considering Price in their search for a new pitching coach, but it’s not clear that he’s any kind of favorite for that job.

Other pitching coach vacancies throughout the league include the Pirates, Phillies, Mets and Dodgers (although Los Angeles may stick internal and elevate Mark Prior to replace the newly retired Rick Honeycutt). The Angels had been searching for a replacement for Doug White, but they’re reportedly set to hire Mickey Callaway. Other vacancies could yet open up, as there are still several ongoing managerial searches — the outcome of which will assuredly impact the composition of those teams’ coaching staffs.

Latest On Boston’s Pitching Coach Search

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Almost two months after the firing of president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, the Red Sox are set to name Chaim Bloom as their chief baseball officer. Bloom will inherit a team whose coaching staff is just about complete, though manager Alex Cora & Co. still have to find a pitching coach to grab the reins from the reassigned Dana LeVangie. The race consists of five individuals and is nearing a conclusion, according to Alex Speier of the Boston Globe.

Of Boston’s quintet of potential LeVangie successors, the previously reported Bryan Price is the only one with experience as a major league pitching coach, Speier relays. Although Price is best known for his ill-fated run as the Reds’ manager from 2014-18, he’s a former professional hurler who oversaw the pitching staffs of the Mariners, Diamondbacks and Reds for a combined 13 years before Cincinnati chose him for its top job.

It’s not fully clear whom Price is vying against to join Boston’s staff, though Speier notes the club has also spoken with in-house candidates and possibly even coaches from the college ranks. Sean McAdam of the Boston Sports Journal (subscription link) suggested last week that Dave Bush, an ex-big league right-hander who has worked with the Red Sox for three seasons, may be in line for a promotion to take over as either the MLB team’s pitching coach or its assistant pitching coach. Chris Cotillo of MassLive.com writes that Bush is “surely” one of the four non-Price choices the Red Sox have interviewed. If true, that still leaves three mystery names in the running for the position.

Red Sox Speak To Bryan Price About Pitching Coach Opening

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The Red Sox have made contact with former Reds manager Bryan Price about their vacant pitching coach position, according to Tim Brown of Yahoo Sports.

With Dana LeVangie transitioning to a role in the Boston scouting department, the next pitching coach will mark the fourth person to hold the post in the last six seasons. Certainly, the organization would like some stability in the position; we’ll see if Price is the man to do just that.

While Price’s track record as a manager is not especially inspiring, he’s generally well-regarded as a pitching coach. Prior to being hired by the Reds, he served as the pitching coach for the Mariners and Diamondbacks. All told, he has 13 years of experience as a pitching coach, so he seems to fit the qualifications for the Red Sox job. He was rumored to have attracted interest last offseason, but if hired, it would be his first MLB coaching job since the Reds fired him in April 2018.

Interestingly, the Red Sox are proceeding with the search for their next pitching coach while the organization’s general manager chair remains unfilled after the deposition of Dave Dombrowski. However, recent news from Boston indicates that the team may be leaning towards an internal candidate to succeed Dombrowski, so the front office may be in sync despite the lack a nominal GM.

Whoever the new pitching coach is, he will certainly have a number of intriguing weapons at his disposal. He’ll be tasked with getting Chris Sale, David Price, and Nathan Eovaldi back on track; all three have demonstrated their sky-high potential but stumbled through 2019, failing to live up to the hefty price tags to which they are attached. Of course, those costly starters aren’t going anywhere, and they’re undeniably instrumental to Boston’s future success, so Price’s approach to solving their issues will likely be a topic of discussion during the interview process.

Beyond that trio, Eduardo Rodriguez was perhaps the most dependable starter in the Red Sox 2019 rotation; at just 26, E-Rod may yet have his best years ahead of him. Much has been made of the barren bullpen mix, and it’s true that there’s considerable ground to be made up in that department; still, relief aces Matt Barnes and Brandon Workman comprise a fine pair of foundational relievers.

Quick Hits: Twins, Price, Rangers

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The Twins’ decision to hire Rocco Baldelli as their new manager meant also passing over incumbent bench coach Derek Shelton and hitting coach James Rowson for the position, but both chief baseball officer Derek Falvey and GM Thad Levine were adamant in expressing their hope that Shelton and Rowson will return to the staff in 2019, per Dan Hayes of The Athletic (subscription link). “We thought all three of those men were worthy of being managers,” said Levine of the trio before adding that it’d be a “tremendous competitive advantage” to have all three on the coaching staff. Shelton, who was the runner-up to Baldelli, took the news professionally but with clear disappointment, according to Levine. “The analogy we presented to Derek (on Wednesday) that we truly believe in is, (Falvey) and I are tackling the role of general manager together,” Levine continued. “We are hopeful that he would be open-minded about tackling the leadership in our clubhouse with Rocco Baldelli.”

A few more notes on some coaching situations around the league…

  • Former Reds manager Bryan Price is drawing interest around the league as a pitching coach, tweets Jerry Crasnick. Price, who was dismissed by Cincinnati in April, was a well-regarded pitching coach with the Mariners and Diamondbacks before serving in that role for the Reds. He ultimately succeeded Dusty Baker as the skipper, but didn’t find much success (not that anyone else would likely have fared much better). In all, Price has 13 years of experience as a big league pitching coach between the three organizations, so he’d bring plenty of experience to a new club in a return to that role.
  • The Rangers’ meandering search for a new manager could suggest some indecisiveness on the team’s part, writes Jeff Wilson of the Star-Telegram. It originally appeared that the club would choose one of eight initial interviewees, but after three of that group — Joe Girardi, David Bell, and Rocco Baldelli — were eliminated, the Rangers have changed course, expanding the search and interviewing more candidates. With no decision imminent, the hiring process may not conclude until after the World Series. Among the most notable names linked to the job are Eric Chavez, Stubby Clapp, and Astros bench coach Joe Espada.
  • Shiraz Rehman, recently hired by the Rangers to be their new assistant GM, has the potential to one day shed the “assistant” from that title, writes Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News. In addition to tracing Rehman’s path to this point of his career, Grant covers the reason for his decision to leave the Cubs to join the Texas organization. Although his title will remain unchanged, it appears that Rehman will enjoy an expanded role and take up a loftier spot on the decisionmaking ladder with his new club. He’ll also be looking at ways to squeeze value out of the team’s resources. Among other things, Rehman says he sees “some real low-hanging fruit, especially in player development,” that he hopes to take advantage of.

NL Central Notes: Butler, Price, DeJong

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Let’s take a look in at the latest notes from around the National League’s Central division:

  • The Cubs have placed long reliever Eddie Butler on the 10-day DL with a groin strain. He turned in four strong appearances to open the year but has been knocked around in his last two and now owns a 4.30 ERA over 14 2/3 innings, with ten strikeouts against five walks. There’s no reason at this point to believe that Butler will be sidelined long. Fellow righty Luke Farrell received the call to take the open active roster spot. He, too, ought to be able to give the team innings in some volume when needed, as he’s stretched out to start.
  • C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic breaks down the Reds’ firing of skipper Bryan Price in a subscription piece. As Rosecrans observes, it is in some regard actually more surprising that Price lasted this long, despite never overseeing a winning product, than that he was fired so early in the current season. Of course, the struggles during his tenure have hardly all been his fault, and it may be that the long-rebuilding team finally felt this was the time to make a statement. There were some internal hopes of improvement entering the year, making it all the harder to stomach an ugly start to the season. GM Dick Williams explained that “now was the right time to do something about” the fact that the team’s offseason work had gone so far south. At the same time, he acknowledged that “this is an organizational disappointment,” not something that falls only at the feet of Price and his staff. It’s certainly hard to escape that conclusion; as I documented in breaking down the Reds’ offseason just yesterday, Price was not exactly given a compelling roster to work with this year or in the past.
  • Fresh off an offseason extension, Cardinals shortstop Paul DeJong has continued to carry above-average overall offensive numbers in his sophomore campaign, due mostly to a healthy .477 slugging percentage. But as Ben Frederickson of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch observes, DeJong is also exhibiting a worrying rise in strikeouts. Indeed, a league-leading thirty of his seventy plate appearances have ended with a K thus far. And DeJong has drawn only four walks, leaving him with a .286 OBP on the young season. As Frederickson notes, the 24-year-od is showing much greater selectivity thus far in 2018 than he did last year, but he’s also swinging and missing at rates typically procured only by elite relief pitchers. Much like young Rockies shortstop Trevor Story, DeJong still needs to show he can get on base consistently enough to be a compelling offensive player.

Reds Fire Bryan Price, Mack Jenkins

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The Reds announced this morning that they’ve fired manager Bryan Price and pitching coach Mack Jenkins. Bench coach Jim Riggleman will assume managerial duties on an interim basis, while Triple-A skipper Pat Kelly will take over Riggleman’s duties as bench coach. Double-A pitching coach Danny Darwin has been added to the Major League coaching staff as well. The Reds will conduct a search for a permanent managerial replacement “later in the year,” the team added.

Bryan Price | David Kohl-USA TODAY Sports

Entering the season, Price was widely speculated to be on the hot seat. The 55-year-old former Reds pitching coach was entering his fifth season as manager in Cincinnati, but the Reds had opted only to exercise his 2018 club option rather than extend him to a longer team deal.

That decision came on the heels of four consecutive losing seasons, and while one can hardly blame the manager for not piling up wins on a clearly rebuilding club, Cincinnati also didn’t seem to demonstrably improve under Price’s watch. The Reds won 76 games in his first season as skipper back in 2014, and since that time they’ve won 64, 68 and 68 games in the respective seasons to follow.

This year’s Reds have been all the more disastrous, opening the year with a 3-15 record with a -46 run differential that easily ranks as the worst in the Majors. The Cincinnati front office clearly felt it was time for a new voice to guide the club, though it’s fair to question why that decision wasn’t simply made before exercising Price’s option, as not much has changed since last September. It’s also worth pointing out that Cincinnati hired former Red Sox and Blue Jays manager John Farrell in a scouting capacity this past offseason, and he’ll almost certainly join the list of managerial candidates when the Reds begin searching (if he doesn’t already top their list).

As for Jenkins, he took over for former pitching coach Mark Riggins back in July 2016, but Reds hurlers haven’t improved much, if any, under his tutelage. The Reds, to be sure, have had their share of meaningful injuries in recent seasons — perhaps none more notable than Anthony DeSclafani, who has not pitched since 2016 — but that doesn’t explain the general lack of development among the team’s more promising young arms. As MLBTR’s Jeff Todd wrote last September:

By measure of fWAR, at least, the 2016-17 Reds hurlers have turned in a two-year stretch of futility that is orders of magnitude worse than any other organization of the past two decades, falling well shy of the dreadful 2004-05 Royals and 2002-03 Devil Rays units.

The 2018 Reds staff hasn’t done anything to correct that tailspin. Cincinnati’s 5.42 ERA, 4.64 xFIP and 4.91 SIERA marks all rank second-worst in the Majors, while their 5.26 FIP as a collective unit is the highest mark of any team in baseball. Cincinnati pitchers rank near the bottom of the league in strikeout percentage and have also posted one of the highest walk percentages of any team in baseball this season.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Rosenthal’s Latest: Cashner, Rangers, Moore, Giants, Reds

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The latest rumblings from FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal (video link)…

  • Impending free agent right-hander Andrew Cashner told Rosenthal that he hasn’t discussed a new deal with the Rangers and expects to test free agency in the offseason. Cashner also expressed confidence that his production this season should lead to plenty of interest on the open market. The 30-year-old owns an excellent 3.19 ERA and a solid 48.1 percent groundball rate through 146 2/3 innings, though he ranks second last among starters in strikeouts per nine innings (4.79) and third from the bottom in swinging-strike percentage (5.7). While Cashner has been a mixed bag this year, he had a worse 2016 between San Diego and Miami but still landed a $10MM guarantee in the offseason.
  • It’s a safe bet that the Giants will exercise left-hander Matt Moore’s $9MM option for 2018 and retain his $10MM option for 2018 in the offseason, says Rosenthal. Although the 28-year-old Moore has recorded the NL’s highest ERA (5.31) through 162 2/3 innings this season, the Giants would rather bet on a bounce-back 2018 at a reasonable cost than subtract from their pitching depth. Buying Moore out would cost the Giants $1MM next year and $750K in 2019.
  • Reds manager Bryan Price will return next season, but his future beyond then is in question, per Rosenthal, who adds that the club could cut the cord if it doesn’t make legitimate progress in 2018. The Reds have gone just 269-359 in three-plus years under Price and are currently one loss away from guaranteeing their fourth straight sub-.500 season during his reign. There hasn’t been much pressure on Price to this point, though, given Cincinnati’s rebuilding status and its lack of pitching.
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