Coaching Notes: Amaro Jr., Astros, Pirates, Red Sox, Tigers
Ruben Amaro Jr. will leave the Red Sox‘ coaching staff and join the Mets as their new first base coach and outfield/baserunning coach, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (via Twitter). Amaro, long the general manager of the Phillies, has spent the past two seasons as the first base coach in Boston. While his path from the front office to a big league coaching staff is anything but conventional, but his experience in a front office will add a unique perspective to rookie manager Mickey Callaway’s staff. It was reported yesterday that the Mets were also promoting Pat Roesseler to hitting coach and hiring veteran pitching coach Dave Eiland.
A few more notes out of the dugout from around the league…
- The Astros will hire Yankees third base coach Joe Espada as their new bench coach, reports ESPN’s Marly Rivera. Espada will step into the role that was vacated when Alex Cora left the Astros to become the new manager of the Red Sox. Like Cora, the 42-year-old Espada will bring a relatively youthful presence to the Houston coaching staff. He’s spent seven seasons as a third base coach at the big league level (2010-13 in Miami, 2015-17 in New York) and has also served as a professional scout in the Yankees organization for a year. He’s also served as a minor league hitting coach and infield coordinator in the Marlins organization.
- After recently extending general manager Neal Huntington and manager Clint Hurdle, the Pirates announced yesterday that their entire coaching staff has been extended through the 2019 season. Hurdle’s current contract runs through the 2021 season. Renowned pitching coach Ray Searage is the most oft-discussed member of Hurdle’s staff, which also includes bench coach Tom Prince, first base coach Kimera Bartee, third base coach Joey Cora, bullpen coach Euclides Rojas, hitting coach Jeff Branson and Major League coach Dave Jauss.
- The Red Sox will have a former big league manager on their staff to support rookie skipper Alex Cora, the team announced yesterday. Former Brewers manager Ron Roenicke, who spent the 2016-17 seasons as the Angels’ third base coach, will serve as Cora’s bench coach. Former Mets first base coach Tom Goodwin will join Boston’s staff as the first base coach and outfield instructor, effectively meaning the Mets and Red Sox have swapped first base/outfield coaches. The Sox also announced that Carlos Febles, who managed their Double-A affiliate in 2017, will join the club as its new third base coach and infield instructor. Bullpen coach Dana LeVangie, will return for his sixth season in that role. He’ll also serve as a catching instructor and assist in advance scouting.
- The Tigers also announced their full staff under new manager Ron Gardenhire yesterday. Former Twins coach Steve Liddle will serve as Gardenhire’s bench coach, returning to the dugout for the first time since 2012 after an 11-year run in Minnesota. Third base coach Dave Clark and hitting coach Lloyd McClendon will return to the staff, and the Tigers are adding minor league hitting coach Phil Clark to the big league staff as an assistant hitting coach as well. Former big league infielder Ramon Santiago, who recently retired from his playing career, will jump right onto the Tigers’ staff as a first base coach. As had already been reported, the Tigers plucked Twins bench coach Joe Vavra to serve as a Quality Control coach and hired former Twins pitching coach Rick Anderson to serve as the bullpen coach. Both were with Gardenhire throughout his tenure as Twins skipper. The club also confirmed its hiring of recently dismissed Cubs pitching coach Chris Bosio to occupy that same role in Detroit.
Mariners Claim Andrew Romine From Tigers
The Mariners announced that they’ve claimed infielder/outfielder Andrew Romine off waivers from the Tigers. He would’ve had the opportunity to elect free agency had he not been claimed. Seattle’s 40-man roster is now at 35 players after also declining options on Hisashi Iwakuma and Yovani Gallardo.
Romine, 32 in December, has been one of the Tigers’ most versatile players in recent years. He’s played all over the diamond for Detroit since coming over from the Angels, including a game at the end of the 2017 season in which he played all nine spots on the field. Despite that Swiss-army-knife-esque profile, though, Romine hasn’t drawn strong reviews from defensive metrics for his infield work, though he has been viewed more favorably in a smallish sample of work in the outfield.
The benefit the Tigers see in his defensive flexibility clearly was outweighed by his lack of offensive production and projected arbitration price point, however. Romine batted just .233/.289/.336 through 348 plate appearances this season and has hit .236/.293/.313 (66 OPS+) overall in parts of four years with the Tigers. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz had projected him to earn $1.9MM via arbitration.
It remains to be seen if the Mariners will keep Romine on the 40-man roster all winter, but he’s presently a candidate to compete with Taylor Motter for a utility role next spring.
Tigers Hire Joe Vavra
The Tigers have hired Joe Vavra to join the staff of new skipper Ron Gardenhire, LaVelle E. Neal III of the Star Tribune reports. Vavra had been employed as the bench coach with the Twins but will become “quality control coach” in his new job, per Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free-Press (via Twitter).
Gardenhire, of course, previously managed in Minnesota. Vavra had never served as his bench coach, but slid into that role under Paul Molitor when he took over for Gardenhire.
Another former Twins coach is also joining the Detroit staff, per the report. Rick Anderson, who served as the pitching coach under Gardenhire, is “expected” to become the Tigers’ bullpen coach.
While the move fills some staff vacancies for the Tigers, it creates a new opening for the Twins. The club had previously announced that it was retaining Vavra and others, after hammering out a new deal with Molitor. Now, it’ll be back on the market for a bench coach.
Tigers to Hire Chris Bosio as Pitching Coach
In a move they were already expected to make, the Detroit Tigers are set to sign former Cubs pitching coach Chris Bosio to their staff. Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times was the first to tweet that a deal was close, and Bob Nightengale of USA Today has confirmed the news with his own tweet.
Bosio served as the Cubs’ pitching coach for five seasons, including their 2016 title run, before being dismissed last week. During his time with the organization, Chicago’s staff pitched to a 3.81 ERA across 8,693 1/3 innings, good for sixth-best in all of baseball. Starters for the Cubs during that time combined for 78.1 fWAR. Bosio coached Jake Arrieta during his Cy Young-winning season, and the club also saw fantastic overall results from pitchers like Jeff Samardzija, Jon Lester and Kyle Hendricks during his tenure with the organization.
Bosio will join the Tigers during a massive teardown, and will be tasked with helping to develop a lot of young players. While Tigers starters as a group have been one of the best in baseball across the past five seasons, their relievers during that span are the worst in baseball by combined fWAR (10.5) and xFIP (4.25). Detroit will hope to turn their bullpen around in a big way with Bosio’s help.
The Tigers are set to open the 2018 season with a group that includes former Rookie of the Year Michael Fulmer, along with Daniel Norris, Jordan Zimmerman and Matt Boyd, along with a relief staff that hasn’t shown much promise outside of Shane Greene. The fact that the Tigers hired Bosio so quickly speaks to their confidence in him. Based on his body of work with the Cubs, it seems as though the Tigers have made a fantastic hire at the outset of a long rebuilding process.
Coaching Notes: Bosio, Honeycutt, Espada, Padres
The latest on some coaching vacancies (or potential vacancies) around baseball…
- The Tigers are “close” to hiring Chris Bosio as their next pitching coach, Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times tweets. The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal previously reported that Bosio was Detroit’s top choice for the job. Bosio worked as the Cubs’ pitching coach for the previous six seasons before being fired after Chicago’s elimination in the NLCS.
- It isn’t yet certain if longtime Dodgers pitching coach Rick Honeycutt will remain in his current job in 2018, Bill Shaikin of the L.A. Times reports. Honeycutt’s two-year contract is up after the World Series and, at the time of the contract’s signing, it was believed that Honeycutt would into a front office job at deal’s end. GM Farhan Zaidi, however, said that “If there’s mutual interest in him continuing in this role, I wouldn’t rule it out,” noting that “We just want to leverage his expertise and experience however we can, with whatever [job] makes the most sense.” Both Zaidi and Honeycutt said that no decisions would be made until after the season is over, with Honeycutt adding “I’m enjoying it as much this year as I ever have. I still enjoy what I do.”
- Yankees third base coach Joe Espada could be a candidate to be the next bench coach for either the Astros or Red Sox, George A. King III of the New York Post writes. Espada has worked in his current role for three seasons, and has previously worked as a Yankees scout, a manager in the Puerto Rican Winter League and as a minor league coach in the Marlins organization. Espada has also been mentioned as a potential contender for the Yankees’ managerial vacancy.
- The Padres will move first base coach Johnny Washington to the assistant hitting coach role and outfield coach Jon Matthews has been reassigned to a new role, Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune reports (Twitter links). 2017 was Washington’s only season as a first base coach; he spent the rest of his nine-year coaching career as a hitting coach at various levels of the Dodgers’ and Padres’ farm systems. Lin notes that the Padres will fill their first base coaching vacancy from within the organization.
Avila On Tigers’ Approach In Free Agency
More typically known for their aggressive spending on the free-agent market, the Tigers appear likely to take a very reserved approach to free agency for a second consecutive offseason, reports MLive.com’s Evan Woodbery. General manager Al Avila tells Woodbery that he’ll be “looking for Major League free agents that are maybe bargains” and suggests that Detroit might not make any additions until January or later.
[Related: Detroit Tigers Offseason Outlook | Detroit Tigers Payroll]
A quiet offseason for the Tigers on the free-agent front has long looked likely with the team embarking on an aggressive rebuild and working to pare back its payroll. Detroit has already parted ways with Cameron Maybin, Justin Wilson, Justin Upton and Justin Verlander in the past calendar year, and it seems extremely likely that longtime second baseman Ian Kinsler and the final year of his contract will be on the move this offseason as well. In making those moves, the Tigers have seen their total of guaranteed contracts owed in 2018 fall from $138MM to $97MM — a number that will fall to $86MM if Kinsler is indeed traded.
As Woodbery points out, the fact that the Tigers are looking to be opportunistic doesn’t mean they won’t spend at all. Detroit will have needs in the outfield, the bullpen and at the back of the rotation, after all, and the asking prices of remaining free agents often begin to come down after the New Year. While many Tigers fans will bristle at the notion of a bargain-bin approach after years of contending atop the AL Central, it’d be virtually impossible to patch the holes that permeate the team’s roster in a single trip through free agency.
While the Tigers’ record doesn’t reflect this, they actually had a fair amount of success with a similar approach last winter. Alex Avila was the team’s lone MLB signing, and he was flipped alongside Wilson to the Cubs in the trade that netted a potential cornerstone piece in Jeimer Candelario. The Detroit front office also eschewed free agency entirely when pursuing a center field addition, ultimately acquiring Mikie Mahtook from the Rays for right-hander Drew Smith (now with the Mets following another trade). Mahtook hit .276/.330/.457 with a dozen homers in 379 PAs and can be controlled for another four seasons. The Tigers also received a solid year at the plate from minor league signee Alex Presley in 2017.
There will likely be a dozen or so starting pitchers that sign one-year commitments this offseason, giving the Tigers a number of options to pursue. Some speculative one-year candidates on the 2017-18 free agent market include Chris Tillman, Brett Anderson, Jeremy Hellickson, Hector Santiago, Francisco Liriano and old friend Doug Fister. The bullpen market contains even more options for Detroit to pursue, and that market, in particular, seems to net several late-offseason bargains on an annual basis.
Quick Hits: Ichiro, Yankees, D’Backs, Gardenhire
Happy birthday to Ichiro Suzuki, as the future Hall-of-Famer turns 44 years old today. Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald takes a look at Ichiro’s offseason training regimen, though “offseason” may not be the correct term since the outfielder has continued to work out at Marlins Park almost every day since the season ended. Near-daily training has been a staple of almost every offseason for Suzuki — he took a month off in 2005 but tells Spencer via an interpreter that “my body just didn’t feel like my own body. My body was, like, sick.” Ichiro has long been known for his incredible fitness regime, and he doesn’t appear to be stopping anytime soon, as he has said that he hopes to keep playing into his 50s.
Here’s the latest from around baseball…
- With the Yankees making a deep postseason run this year, Joel Sherman of the New York Post has a few suggestions on what the club must now do to cement itself as a World Series contender. The list includes signing Shohei Otani, cutting down on strikeouts, re-signing CC Sabathia, reinforcing the bullpen by signing Mike Minor, and trading a high-paid veteran to ensure that the team gets under the $197MM luxury tax threshold. Sherman also floats the idea of shifting Gary Sanchez into a part-time DH role with Otani, which then necessitates signing a backup catcher capable of handling a workload of around 60 games.
- The Diamondbacks‘ roster is broken down by Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic, who looks at both 2018 salary (hat tip to Piecoro for citing MLBTR’s arbitration projections) and each player’s role on next year’s club. With payroll size still an issue for the D’Backs, players such as Patrick Corbin or even A.J. Pollock could come up in trade talks since both will be free agents in the 2018-19 offseason. Brandon Drury or Nick Ahmed are cheaper but could also potentially be shopped due to a logjam of other infield options. Piecoro predicts Arizona will exercise its $2MM club option on Daniel Descalso since the veteran “was a big part of the clubhouse culture.”
- The Tigers‘ choice of Ron Gardenhire as the team’s next manager “was a solid hire. It was a safe one, too,” The Athletic’s Katie Strang writes (subscription required and recommended). Both Gardenhire and Tigers GM Al Avila are under contract through 2020, so there is no small sense that Avila’s own job security will be scrutinized as the Tigers undergo a lengthy rebuild. Strang also shares some details on the Tigers’ managerial search, which included a wide variety of candidates but seemed to wrap up quickly (before even a second round of interviews) once Gardenhire emerged as the top contender.
Tigers Inform Anibal Sanchez His Option Will Be Declined
In a widely expected move, the Tigers will decline their $16MM option on right-hander Anibal Sanchez in favor of a $5MM buyout, general manager Al Avila told reporters today (Twitter link via Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free Press). Sanchez will become a free agent once the option is formally bought out following the World Series.
The 33-year-old Sanchez signed a five-year, $80MM contract with the Tigers that spanned the 2013-17 seasons and turned in a sensational campaign in the first year of that deal. In 182 innings that year, Sanchez captured the American League ERA title with a mark of 2.57, averaging 10.0 K/9 against 2.7 BB/9 along the way. He finished fourth in the AL Cy Young voting and was worth roughly six wins above replacement per both fWAR and rWAR. Though he was limited to 126 innings in 2014, Sanchez was again quite good, logging a 3.43 ERA with improved control but diminished strikeouts.
Since contributing about nine wins’ worth of value in those first two seasons, though, the Sanchez contract has been regrettable for the Tigers. He’s logged a total of 415 2/3 innings in that time and surrendered 262 earned runs (5.67 ERA) on the strength of 462 hits (85 homers) and 131 walks. Sanchez still shows a penchant for missing bats (8.2 K/9 over the final three years of the deal, 8.9 K/9 in 2017), but his ground-ball rate has eroded and he’s become stunningly homer prone.
[Detroit Tigers Depth Chart | Detroit Tigers Payroll Outlook]
The rebuilding Tigers, who introduced Ron Gardenhire as their new manager earlier today, will happily shed that $16MM annual commitment from their books and turn to younger rotation options. In 2018, they’ll likely lean on Michael Fulmer, Daniel Norris, Matthew Boyd and veteran Jordan Zimmermann (who is on an undesirable contract himself) in the first four spots of their rotation. While the Tigers have several in-house options for that fifth spot, they’re also in a nice position to take a flyer on a veteran reclamation project in hopes of flipping him for some value at next year’s trade deadline, as I examined in their installment of MLBTR’s Offseason Outlook series.
With Sanchez off the books, the Tigers still have $97MM owed to four current players (Miguel Cabrera, Zimmermann, Victor Martinez and Ian Kinsler) and two former players (Prince Fielder, Justin Verlander). The Tigers also have another $25MM worth of projected arbitration salaries, per MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz. An offseason trade of Kinsler and/or the non-tendering or trades of an arbitration-eligible player or two would obviously alter that payroll projection.
As for Sanchez, he’ll hit the open market in search of a spot to restore his value — very likely on a one-year deal with a low base salary or on a minor league pact. While he struggled as both a starter and reliever this season, Sanchez did post very solid K/BB numbers throughout the year — particularly upon returning from a month-long stint in Triple-A. He enjoyed solid eight-start run upon his return from the minors (4.37 ERA, 3.89 FIP, 37-to-10 K/BB ratio in 45 1/3 innings) and finished out the year with 23 innings of 2.70 ERA ball and a 31-to-7 K/BB ratio.
Suffice it to say, Sanchez was the picture of inconsistency in 2017 — often showing glimpses of his former excellence but also too frequently giving the Tigers little chance to compete. He yielded four or more earned runs in eight of his 17 starts and five or more earned runs on five occasions. Sanchez also posted the worst HR/9 mark of any pitcher with 100 or more innings in 2017 (2.22), and no starter with at least 400 innings has been as homer-prone as Sanchez (1.84 HR/9) dating back to the 2015 season.
Tigers Sign Ron Gardenhire To Three-Year Contract
11:30am: The Tigers have formally announced the hiring of Gardenhire, noting that he has indeed signed a three-year contract with the club.
OCT. 20, 7:40am: The Tigers have scheduled a press conference for 1pm ET today to announce the hiring.
OCT. 19: Ron Gardenhire has agreed to a three-year deal to become the Tigers’ next manager, per Jon Morosi of MLB Network (Twitter link). The deal could be announced tomorrow; Detroit’s decision to tab the veteran skipper was first reported earlier today by Ken Rosenthal and Katie Strang of The Athletic (subscription required and recommended).
Detroit will install the widely respected 59-year-old in the dugout in place of Brad Ausmus, whom the club decided not to retain past the present season. Gardenhire previously managed the division-rival Twins and most recently served as the Diamondbacks’ bench coach. He also fought through a diagnosis of prostate cancer earlier this year, returning to help guide the Diamondbacks to a successful season.
At last check, Tigers GM Al Avila had cast a wide net in lining up options. While there was no prior indication that a decision was looming, Detroit obviously decided to go ahead with Gardenhire, perhaps due in some part to ongoing competition with other organizations. Gardenhire was also under consideration for the Red Sox job, though that is expected to go to Alex Cora.
After moving on from Ausmus, who was a rookie skipper when he signed on, the Tigers have indicated a clear preference for a candidate with prior time as a MLB manager. Gardenhire certainly checks that box. He spent thirteen years running things for the Twins, beginning in 2012. That tenure spanned quite a few good years, including a run of six postseason appearances in nine years, though the team’s performance fell off sharply in his final four campaigns.
Gardy ultimately delivered a 1,068-and-1,039 win/loss record during his time in Minnesota, which wrapped up after the 2014 campaign. He failed to guide the team into the World Series and only made it out of the divisional round once despite the run of regular season success.
In any event, postseason considerations likely won’t be much of a factor early in Gardenhire’s tenure with Detroit. The team is only just embarking upon a rebuilding effort that is likely to take several seasons to come to fruition, after all, placing it more in the situation that the Twins found themselves in back in 2011 — the first year of the four-season run of misery. Gardenhire, then, has his share of experience in bringing along younger players through a rebuilding stage. While he ultimately was cut loose in Minnesota, perhaps some of his efforts are beginning to bear fruit there.
It’ll be interesting to see how this relationship works out. Avila had suggested a need for a new approach from a new skipper, but evidently was not referring to a strong sabermetric predilection. Gardenhire brings a reputation as an old-school manager, after all. As Joe Posnanski wrote at the end of his tenure in Minnesota: “Gardy comes from the Tom Kelly school — he was the valedictorian of the Tom Kelly school — where managers grump and demand and instill and bunt too much and occasionally fall in love with limited but gritty players.” That said, Gardenhire is also said to carry a new “openness” to modern analytics after his year with the D-Backs, Morosi tweets. Avila and the Tigers are betting that approach will help foster the growth of a new core and ultimately guide the team back into contention.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
The Tigers’ Managerial Search
The Tigers were the first team to cut ties with their manager at season’s end, announcing with less than a week of the regular season to play that Brad Ausmus would not return as the team’s skipper. Ausmus was allowed to finish out the season at the helm — though Ian Kinsler was allowed to manage the team on the final day — but since the announcement, there have been plenty of names flying around in connection with the new job opening.
In an effort to consolidate the myriad reports on Detroit’s managerial vacancy into one place, we’ll track preliminary candidates, those that have interviewed and those that are no longer in the running all in this post and update accordingly as the search progresses.
Will Interview/Have Interviewed
- Cubs bench coach Dave Martinez has also interviewed for the Tigers’ opening, reports FanRag’s Jon Heyman, who also notes that Detroit’s search is down from an initial list of 50 to 10 candidates. Heyman initially identified Rockies bench coach Mike Redmond as a candidate (as noted below), and he now confirms that Redmond has indeed interviewed for the post.
- Ron Gardenhire is on the list of the Tigers’ upcoming interviews and is a “strong candidate,” according to Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free Press. Fenech notes that the Tigers will face some competition, namely from the Red Sox, however. There are those who feel that Avila will ultimately hire a younger manager to handle a younger team, per Fenech, though Fenech also adds that he polled a number of industry contacts that feel Gardenhire is capable of connecting with a young group regardless of age.
- ESPN’s Marly Rivera reports that the Tigers will interview Astros bench coach Alex Cora as part of their first wave of external interviews (Twitter link). Cora is an in-demand managerial candidate, as he’s already been linked to the Mets and Red Sox. An interview doesn’t seem likely to take place while Cora’s Astros are still playing in the postseason, one wouldn’t think.
- MLB.com’s Jason Beck has previously reported that the Tigers will interview Marlins bench coach Fredi Gonzalez and White Sox third base coach Joe McEwing. Gonzalez, of course, has recently served as the Marlins’ manager as well as the manager of the Braves. McEwing doesn’t have big league managerial experience, but he’s come up as a candidate in years past and has been connected to the Mets already as well.
- Fenech reported early this month that the Tigers have already conducted interviews with a trio of in-house candidates: hitting coach Lloyd McClendon, first base coach Omar Vizquel and third base coach Dave Clark. McClendon has had multiple big league stints as a manager, with the Pirates (2001-05) and the Mariners (2014-15).
Preliminary Candidates (Interview Status Still Unknown)
- The Tigers are interested in Red Sox first base coach Ruben Amaro Jr., according to FanRag’s Jon Heyman. Amaro is obviously best known as the former GM of the Phillies, but he’s interested in managing and now has two years of experience on a big league staff to go along with an understanding of the day-to-day operations of a front office. As Heyman notes, he’s an outside-the-box candidate, but the Tigers are known to be casting a wide net.
- Heyman has also previously reported that the Tigers have interest in Rockies bench coach Mike Redmond. The longtime backup catcher for the Marlins and Twins, Redmond is also a former Marlins manager but has yet to get a second opportunity to manage at the big league level.
- Jon Morosi of MLB.com has previously listed Angels bench coach Dino Ebel and Royals catching instructor Pedro Grifol as managerial possibilities in Detroit. Heyman, meanwhile has previously linked them to Rays third base coach Charlie Montoyo.