Rockies Hire Jeff Pickler As Bench Coach
The Rockies announced the hiring of Jeff Pickler as bench coach. Thomas Harding of MLB.com reported the move before the club announcement.
Pickler, who turns 50 in January, worked as game-planning/outfield coach with the Reds from 2019-24. He’d worked under skipper David Bell during that time but was not retained when Cincinnati hired Terry Francona. Before his time in Cincinnati, Pickler spent two seasons on the Minnesota coaching staff. Harding points out that Pickler had also worked in scouting with the Diamondbacks and Padres when Josh Byrnes was general manager of those clubs. Colorado hired Byrnes as GM underneath baseball operations president Paul DePodesta a couple weeks ago.
Before entering the scouting ranks, Pickler played eight minor league seasons as an infielder. That included one season in the Rox system. Pickler finished his playing days with their Triple-A club in 2005.
The Rockies have made a handful of hirings as Warren Schaeffer enters his first full season in the managerial role. Brett Pill (hitting coach), Alon Leichman (pitching coach), Gabe Ribas (assistant pitching coach), and Matt Buschmann (bullpen coach) are also in place. Colorado had used Clint Hurdle as interim bench coach after firing skipper Bud Black in May. It’s unclear whether Hurdle will remain in the organization in 2026.
Rockies Fire Bud Black
Forty games into his ninth season as the Rockies’ manager, Bud Black has been fired. The Rox announced today that Black and longtime bench coach Mike Redmond have been dismissed in the wake of the team’s nightmarish start to the 2025 season. Warren Schaeffer (previously the club’s third base coach) will serve as interim manager for the remainder of the season, and hitting coach and ex-manager Clint Hurdle will become the interim bench coach.
“Our play so far this season, especially coming off the last two seasons, has been unacceptable. Our fans deserve better, and we are capable of better,” Rockies owner Dick Monfort said in an official press release. “While we all share responsibility in how this season has played out, these changes are necessary. We will use the remainder of 2025 to improve where we can on the field and to evaluate all areas of our operation so we can properly turn the page into the next chapter of Rockies Baseball. I want to thank Bud Black and Mike Redmond for their contributions to the organization across their eight years here. I appreciate their hard work and dedication and wish them nothing but the best going forward.”
In other coaching changes, assistant hitting coach Andy Gonzalez will take over as the new third base coach, USA Today’s Bob Nightengale reports. Jordan Pacheco and Nic Wilson will become the Rockies’ new hitting coaches.
Colorado’s 9-3 victory over the Padres today improved the Rockies’ record to a miserable 7-33, putting the Rox on pace to challenge the all-time loss record set by the White Sox just a year ago. Against this backdrop, it isn’t surprising to see some changes in the dugout, even for an organization that has long prized loyalty. The Rockies made another prominent coaching change in mid-April, when Hurdle went from special assistant to the GM to his hitting coach role after Hensley Meulens was fired.
The 2025 campaign was Black’s 18th as a big league manager, with nine seasons apiece with the Padres (from 2007-15) and Rockies (2017-today). Black has winning records in only four of those seasons, as his 1193-1403 career record is broken down as a 649-713 record in San Diego and a 544-690 mark in Colorado. While the numbers aren’t in Black’s favor, his overall effectiveness as a manager is still somewhat hard to gauge. The Padres were in a rebuilding phase for portions of Black’s tenure, and the Rockies’ issues are so myriad that it is hard to single out Black as a particular reason for the club’s extreme struggles.
Black’s arrival in Denver marked the Rockies’ last successful stretch, as the club reached the postseason as a wild card in his first two seasons as the skipper (and Black won NL Manager of the Year honors in 2017). Since then, however, the Rox have reeled off six straight losing seasons, and the 2025 season already seems like the seventh in that increasingly dismal stretch of baseball. Colorado is already coming off the two worst seasons in franchise history, after losing 103 games in 2023 and 101 games last year.
There was some speculation that Black could be let go following last season, yet the Rockies announced in October that the skipper had been signed to a one-year extension covering 2025. Black’s contract situation was somewhat unique, as it was believed that Black was essentially a rolling year-to-year deal (as described by reporter Nick Groke), yet the fact that the Rockies waited until October to finalize Black’s return was perhaps a sign of some discontent. Black’s previous two extensions had been announced in March 2022 and March 2023, giving the manager plenty of extra security and removing any lame-duck perception.
It may be that Monfort genuinely believed Black could still get things turned around, though things have gone so haywire so early that ownership had no choice but to make some kind of change. Ironically, GM Bill Schmidt just gave Black a vote of confidence yesterday in an interview with Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post, just hours before the Rockies perhaps hit rock bottom in a 21-0 loss to San Diego.
At the time, Schmidt said “I don’t think we are” at the point of requiring a managerial change. “I think our guys are still playing hard, and that’s what I look at,” Schmidt explained. “Guys are working hard every day, they come with energy, for the most part….Guys still believe in what we are doing and where we are headed. We are all frustrated.”
Of course, player effort doesn’t overcome a marked lack of talent on the roster. Colorado’s struggles have been exacerbated by lack of action from the front office, as the Rockies haven’t done much to either clearly upgrade the team, or to go in the other direction of blowing things up for a full rebuild. Monfort has often been accused of being both too optimistic about his team’s potential and too insular in his hiring practices, which has left the Rockies seemingly lagging behind the rest of the league not just on the field, but also in terms of analytics, scouting, player development, and other front office practices.
Since Monfort’s statement painted 2025 as an evaluation year, it could be that the Rockies’ brutal start has finally inspired a broader change of direction at Coors Field. What this might mean for Schmidt (a longtime staffer who became interim GM in 2021 and then the full-time GM after that season) remains to be seen, or if the Rox will perhaps explore a fire sale at the trade deadline.
Schaeffer has been a member of Colorado’s organization dating back to his playing days, as he was a 38th-round draft pick in 2007 and spent his entire six-year playing career in the Rockies’ farm system. After retiring from the field, he turned to coaching and managed three different Rockies affiliates from 2015-22, and Schaeffer then became the big league third base coach prior to the 2023 season.
While first-time MLB managers are rarely stepping into an ideal situation, the 40-year-old Schaeffer faces a tall order in trying to salvage anything from the 2025 Rockies’ season. At this point, perhaps just avoiding a record number of losses would count as a minor triumph, even if another 100-loss season seems inevitable.
Schaeffer will have an experienced voice to help him in Hurdle, who managed the Rockies from 2002-09 and led the franchise to its only World Series appearance in 2007. Hurdle also managed the Pirates from 2011-19 before retiring, and then returning to baseball in his special assistant role during the 2021-22 offseason.
Redmond and Black were hired in the same offseason, so Redmond had been Black’s chief lieutenant throughout the manager’s entire tenure in Denver. A former 13-year veteran of the big leagues, Redmond is perhaps best known for his own former managerial stint with the Marlins over the 2013-15 seasons.
Photo courtesy of Ron Chenoy – Imagn Images
Rockies Fire Hitting Coach Hensley Meulens, Clint Hurdle Named Replacement
The Rockies announced that hitting coach Hensley Meulens has been relieved of his duties. Special assistant to the general manager Clint Hurdle has been named hitting coach for the remainder of the season.
It’s an unusual move, as coaching changes don’t usually happen so early in a season. There’s no denying that the results haven’t been pretty for the club in the early going. They are currently 3-15, the worst record in the majors. Their team-wide batting line of .220/.285/.344 translates to a 65 wRC+, also worst in the majors.
But that’s not exactly a surprising development. The club finished the past two seasons with more than 100 losses and did very little to improve the team in the winter. They are one of the few clubs that came into the 2025 season with no real hopes of contending. It would be hard to lay all of the blame on the hitting coach when the roster mostly features unestablished young players and veteran journeymen.
Presumably, the Rockies once felt that Meulens was the right guy to help their young hitters develop. If not, then they probably should have made this move in the winter as opposed to 18 games into the campaign. Perhaps more information will come to light and help put this into context, but for now, it’s a bit of a head-scratcher.
Meulens, 57, played in the majors from 1989 to 1998. After his playing days ended, he pivoted to a coaching career, starting in the minor leagues. He got his first major league coaching gig in 2010 when he became the hitting coach of the Giants. That club won the World Series three times while he was in the dugout. He then had stints as the bench coach for the Mets and assistant hitting coach for the Yankees before joining the Rockies as hitting coach ahead of the 2023 season.
Hurdle, 67, also has a lengthy baseball track record. He played in the majors from 1977 to 1987. He quickly pivoted to a managerial career, getting started with some minor league work after his playing days ended. He joined the Rockies organization in 1994, working as a minor league instructor, and eventually got the big league skipper job in 2002. He held that role for many years and was at the helm for the club’s run to the World Series in 2007, though he was fired partway through the 2009 season.
He served as the Rangers’ hitting coach in 2010 and then got another managerial job a year later, joining the Pirates for the 2011 campaign. He skippered the Pirates through 2019, steering the club to their only three postseason appearances this millenium, which were from 2013-2015. He returned to the Rockies as a special assistant to the general manager in November of 2021 but is now set to return to the dugout.
Photo courtesy of Allan Henry, Imagn Images
West Notes: Giants, Yamamoto, Angels, Leiter
The Giants have long been expected to be one of the winter’s more aggressive teams after missing out on megadeals for stars Aaron Judge and Carlos Correa last offseason. While the club was still active on last year’s free agent market, deals for lower-profile players like Taylor Rogers, Michael Conforto and Mitch Haniger didn’t save San Francisco from a 79-83 campaign that ended with a fourth place finish in the NL West this year. As president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi and his front office looks to turn things around ahead of the 2024 season, the club has been connected to plenty of top players this offseason, ranging from star outfielders Cody Bellinger and Juan Soto to reigning NL Cy Young award winner Blake Snell to even two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani.
One such star the Giants are known to have interest in is NPB right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who Zaidi himself noted the club has scouted extensively in the run-up to his posting late last month. Today, Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle provided an update on the club’s interest in Yamamoto, who ranked as the #3 free agent in this year’s edition of MLBTR’s annual top 50 free agents list. Per Slusser, other teams interested in Yamamoto believe that the Giants “have an edge” in the sweepstakes for his services. Yamamoto figures to be among the most sought-after free agents this winter, with reports indicating that nearly half the league has interest in the 25-year-old righty. The Mets and Yankees, in particular, have been connected to Yamamoto heavily to this point in the offseason.
Even if San Francisco does have a leg up in the Yamamoto sweepstakes, a signing would surely require a major financial outlay. The righty is widely expected to secure the largest deal of any starting pitcher on the market this winter besides Ohtani; MLBTR has projected him for a nine-year, $225MM deal that would only be surpassed by the guarantees secured by Gerrit Cole and Stephen Strasburg among free agent starters. That shouldn’t be a problem for San Francisco, which reportedly offered Judge a deal in the $360MM range last offseason before 2022’s AL MVP ultimately returned to the Yankees.
More from MLB’s West divisions…
- The Angels have made significant headway in assembling their 2024 coaching staff under new manager Ron Washington in recent weeks, though USA Today’s Bob Nightengale suggests the club previously offered both former Pirates and Rockies manager Clint Hurdle as well as 21-year MLB veteran LaTroy Hawkins roles on Washington’s staff; Hurdle was offered a job as Washington’s bench coach while Hawkins was offered the bullpen coach role. Nightengale goes on to note both men are expected to retain their current roles as special assistants to the front offices in Colorado and Minnesota, respectively. That’s hardly a surprise, as the club has reportedly hired Steve Karsay as the new bullpen coach in Anaheim while bench coach Ray Montgomery will remain in that role for a third season in 2024.
- The Rangers were open to moving right-handed prospect Jack Leiter at the trade deadline this summer in the right deal for pitching, according to Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News. The second-overall pick of the 2021 draft was initially expected to be a fast-rising arm who could impact the big league club shortly after being drafted, but the righty has struggled to this point in his professional career. While Grant notes that Leiter made some strides last season, he’s not yet ready to contribute in the majors and could be part of the return for a front-of-the-rotation arm, should Texas look to the trade market in their search for rotation upgrades this winter. While Leiter has a career 5.37 ERA across two minor league seasons, the 23-year-old ended the 2023 campaign on a relative high note with a 3.31 ERA and a 39.7% strikeout rate in his final four starts at the Double-A level.
Angels Hire Ryan Goins, Eric Young Sr. To Coaching Staff
TODAY: The Angels have indeed hired Young, as he confirmed to Alison Mastrangelo of WSB TV (X link). “It was a hard decision, and I am definitely going to miss the [Braves] organization and more importantly the players and fans,” Young said.
NOVEMBER 11: Just a few days after joining the Angels as the club’s new manager, Ron Washington has begun assembling his coaching staff for the 2024 season, as The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal reports that recently-retired infielder Ryan Goins will join the Angels’ coaching staff as an infield coach. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale had previously linked Goins to the role.
Goins, 35, was a fourth-round pick in the 2009 draft and spent five seasons in Toronto at the major league level from 2013-17. He then spent one season with the Royals before joining the White Sox in 2019. Goins played on the south side of Chicago for two seasons and played what would ultimately be his final game at the big league level during the 2020 season. He continued his career in the minor leagues for the Braves in 2021 and 2022, overlapping with Washington’s time in Atlanta as third base coach. While he signed with the Royals on a minor league deal for the 2023 season, he did not appear in any games before ultimately retiring earlier this offseason.
In 555 career games at the big league level, Goins slashed .228/.278/.333 in addition to a scoreless inning of work on the mound back in 2016. He appeared at every position except for catcher and center field throughout his eight seasons in the majors. With his playing career in the rearview mirror, Goins is now poised to tackle the first coaching job of his career under Washington in Anaheim. In doing so, he’ll been the youth and perspective of a recent player to the staff of Washington, a 71-year-old veteran skipper who last played in the majors in 1989.
Though Goins appears to be the only official hire for Washington’s coaching staff at this point, plenty of names have already been mentioned in connection with various roles. In addition to linking Goins to his role as infield coach, Nightengale suggested that former A’s, Cubs, Red Sox, and Mets hitting coach Chili Davis could join Washington’s staff in that same role, former Rockies and Pirates manager Clint Hurdle could join as bench coach, 19-year MLB veteran Torii Hunter could be tapped as first base coach, and Braves first base coach Eric Young Sr. could join the club’s staff as third base coach.
It’s not yet clear if any of those additional names have been or will be formally hired by the Angels, though Jon Heyman of the New York Post confirmed that both Davis and Hurdle are “in the mix” to join Washington’s staff while cautioning that nothing is official yet. On the other hand, Heyman suggests that Young is “planning” to join Washington’s staff alongside Goins. Though Hunter’s candidacy for a coaching role hasn’t been corroborated elsewhere, it’s certainly reasonable to think he could be in the mix for a role given his status as a candidate for the club’s manager seat prior to the hiring of Washington.
Rockies Name Clint Hurdle Special Assistant To GM
The Rockies are bringing former manager Clint Hurdle back to the organization as a special assistant to general manager Bill Schmidt, as Tracy Ringolsby first reported at Inside The Seams. He’ll start his new role Jan. 1, per Ringolsby. MLB.com’s Thomas Harding adds that Hurdle will focus, in particular, on player development.
As is so often the case with Rockies, their latest front-office hire is a key figure who is well known by owner Dick Monfort. Hurdle managed the Rockies from 2002-09, during which time Colorado appeared in its lone World Series (2007). Prior to that, he’d served as the team’s Major League hitting coach and a minor league hitting instructor.
Hurdle’s Rockies couldn’t recapture that 2007 form in 2008, finishing the season with a 74-88 record as they tried to weather injuries to both Todd Helton and Troy Tulowitzki. After an 18-28 start to the ’09 season, Hurdle was dismissed as the team’s skipper and offered a new role elsewhere in the organization. Ultimately, however, the two sides parted ways. Just two seasons later, Hurdle was managing the Pirates, where he’d serve as skipper from 2011-19 — an even lengthier run than the one he enjoyed in Colorado.
The Athletic’s Nick Groke chatted with Hurdle back in June, gauging the former skipper’s interest to returning to a Rockies organization that was now in transition. Hurdle wouldn’t directly confirm interest from the team or a willingness to return, though he alluded to both in calling Denver a “special place” and noting that there were “only a couple places that I would leave my family and my home to embark on something new.”
Ringolsby notes that Hurdle’s new role will still allow the now-64-year-old former skipper to spend time with his family in addition to his role with the team. He’ll still bring an experienced voice — it’s been more than 45 years since the Royals drafted Hurdle with the No. 9 overall pick in 1975 — to a Rockies front office that has seen a good bit of turnover in recent months.
Jeff Bridich was ousted as general manager early in the season, and assistant GMs Zach Wilson and Jon Weil left the organization not long after. Schmidt, the longtime scouting director in Colorado, was elevated to interim GM and then formally named GM on the penultimate day of the regular season — before the Rockies even had the opportunity to talk with candidates from other organizations.
Latest On Rockies’ GM Search
The Rockies are leaning towards naming interim general manager Bill Schmidt the club’s permanent GM, reports Bob Nightengale of USA Today. Indeed, Nightengale adds that Schmidt has already been conducting interviews with potential candidates for other important front office positions.
Schmidt has been leading the Rockies’ front office since early May, when he took over on an interim basis after the franchise and Jeff Bridich parted ways. Schmidt has been a fixture in the Colorado organization for more than two decades, leading the club’s draft room since 2000. Certainly, he’s as familiar as anyone with the ins and outs of the franchise.
Rockies’ owner Dick Monfort has been extremely loyal to his top front office personnel. Colorado has had only two full-time general mangers since 1999, when Dan O’Dowd assumed the top role. O’Dowd remained in charge of baseball operations until 2014, when the franchise promoted Bridich (who’d been in the organization for ten years already) to lead the staff until this season.
To be sure, there’d be some merit to removing the interim tag from Schmidt’s title. Colorado’s had some success finding future stars (most notably Nolan Arenado and Trevor Story) during his time heading the amateur draft. And the team has outperformed general expectations since Schmidt took over baseball operations on May 3. After opening the season 10-18, Colorado has gone a respectable 47-48 despite a roster that looks like one of the league’s weakest on paper. How much credit Schmidt deserves for that decent run is debatable, but the team showing some signs of life certainly couldn’t hurt his candidacy.
That said, the Rockies promoting Schmidt to the full-time role wouldn’t be without some backlash. Monfort’s longstanding preference for promoting from within has led to criticism about the franchise’s hiring processes being too insular. Nightengale also reports that Colorado is expected to hire former manager Clint Hurdle in some sort of front office capacity, which would further fuel that criticism.
Moreover, Schmidt’s handling of this past summer’s trade deadline wasn’t without its detractors. Colorado held onto Story, Jon Gray, C.J. Cron, Germán Márquez and Daniel Bard, resisting a more comprehensive teardown. Keeping impending free agents Story, Gray and Cron, in particular, perplexed many onlookers (Story himself included). Schmidt almost certainly had Monfort’s support — implicit or explicit — in mostly standing pat, though, so it’s impossible from the outside to parse out credit or blame among Rockies’ brass for that decision.
If Schmidt gets the full-time position, he’ll have his work cut out for him in rebuilding his front office. In March, Ken Rosenthal and Nick Groke of the Athletic throughly reported a mass exodus among Rockies staffers last offseason. In the intervening months, Bridich has departed, as have assistant general managers Jon Weil and Zach Wilson. Replacing those higher-level executives figures to be a key focus for the Rox in the coming months.
Three Teams Who’ve Yet To Win Their Division
It is somewhat amazing that there are three National League teams – one each for the West, East, and Central – that have yet to win their division.
Make no mistake, the American League has its share of heartbreak. The Mariners have yet to return to the playoffs after their 116-win season in 2001. The Rangers are far away as ever from capturing their first World Series after the so-close-you-can-taste-it near-misses of 2010 and 2011. Fans of the Astros and Red Sox have suffered different brands of heartbreak after the legitimacy of their recent winners was called into question.
But in the National League, the Rockies, Marlins, and Pirates have never won their respective divisions.
Granted, the Pirates were crowned champs of the National League East 9 times, including a three-peat for Jim Leyland’s clubs from 1990 to 1992 and a title-winner way back in 1979 – but since they moved to the NL Central in 1994: goose eggs. That’s a 26-year-run without a divisional crown, a mark of futility eclipsed only by the Rockies and Marlins. Colorado and Florida both entered the league in 1993, and neither has landed the top spot in their division in the 27 seasons since.
Back in the junior circuit, every team in the AL East has won since 2010 (Tampa Bay). In the Central, the White Sox have the longest drought (11 seasons), going back to their first-place finish in 2008. Everyone in the AL West has taken their turn at the top since 2012 – except the Mariners, of course, who won the division in 2001 and 1997.
But each division in the National League has its slow-and-steady competitor, so let’s take a quick look at each.
Colorado Rockies
Of these three clubs, the Rockies’ reputation took the fewest hits over the last 27 years. The Blake Street Bombers hold a particular place in baseball lore, and there’s a general sense of “unfortunate circumstances” around the Rox because of the thin air in Colorado. The impossibility of housing a winning pitching staff at Coors Field is baseball cliche now, but that doesn’t make the challenge any less potent.
Here’s what I wrote of Colorado in their Offseason In Review post back in March: “Colorado pitching, after all, has proven one of the more frustrating team-building challenges in the major leagues. The Sisyphean task of constructing even a league-average pitching staff at Coors Field persists year-after-year. Over the course of their 27-season history, the Rockies posted a league-average or better team ERA just three times (2010, 2009, 2007). In 2010, Jim Tracy’s 83-win squad finished with an exactly-league-average ERA, but those other two seasons — 2009, 2007 — happen to be two of the only three seasons in which the Rockies won 90 games in their history.”
Adding to the task at hand for Colorado, there’s at least a possibility that ownership believes this team is better than it is. They lost 91 games last year and have exhibited zero financial flexibility. If they end up losing close to 90 games again (or the equivalent in whatever kind of season is played in 2020), then the Rockies are still probably in the decline phase, not yet having rebooted into a full-blown rebuild. Rebuilds, of course, are time-intensive when done right, and very time-intensive when rushed.
The Rockies have made the postseason a handful of times, and they won the pennant in 2007, but they’re caught in no-man’s-land now. The Dodgers have won the division 7 years running, and Walker Buehler, Cody Bellinger, and company have plenty left in the tank. The Padres’ stable of young arms makes them one of the more intriguing up-and-coming teams in the league, and the Diamondbacks continue to impress with their ability to retool on the fly. After coming within a play-in game of taking the crown from the Dodgers in 2018, the Rockies might have missed their best shot.
Miami Marlins
The Marlins entered the league at a tough time to be a member of the NL East. The Atlanta Braves held a hammerlock on the division, taking the crown every season from 1995 until 2005 (they were in the NL West before that). To their credit, the Marlins made themselves into a competitive squad pretty quick, making the playoffs as a wild card in 1997, just their fifth season of existence. The organization made its name the year after, however, in selling off the pieces of their World Series winner and cratering into a 108-loss squad. After that horrid 1998 season, it took the Marlins five more years to get back to the playoffs again, at which point it was second-verse-same-as-the-first. They didn’t sink quite so fast or quite so far the second time around, but they also haven’t recovered (no playoff appearances since 2003).
That said, the Marlins have begun to see the light from their decade-plus in limbo. MLBTR’s own Mark Polishuk wrapped up the Marlins offseason back in March with this: “It’s a sign of progress, however, that the scorched-earth phase of the rebuild seems to be over. Villar, Kintzler, or other veterans on short-term deals could well end up being moved at the trade deadline, but it doesn’t seem like younger talent is on the move…Miami seems ready to find out if the young players it already has in the fold could end up being part of that next Marlins winner, and it will be intriguing to see which of the pitchers and position players take that next step in 2020.”
The current era of Marlins baseball is best known for shepherding the likes of Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, and Marcell Ozuna out of town prior to the 2018 season. But they’re also a unique entrant on this mini-list because they won not just one, but two World Series titles over this span. Derek Jeter now helms the organization, and though they don’t have that face-of-the-franchise type player soaking up their spotlight, they’ve become increasingly competitive. Heading into whichever season of baseball comes next, they’ll have a decent collection of starting pitchers to keep them in games – with a smaller host of position player prospects nearing the majors. Whether they have that franchise-changing talent in the upper ranks is unclear. Business might not yet be booming in Miami, but it’s better.
Pittsburgh Pirates
As stated above, it’s a bit unfair for the Pirates to be lumped in with the expansion clubs from the nineties, as they do have a history of success in the major leagues. They have 9 division crowns, 7 World Series appearances, and 5 World Series banners. But that’s all ancient history.
Since moving to the NL Central in 1994, the Pirates are a firm contender for the most moribund franchise in the sport. The departure of Barry Bonds after the 1992 season put an unfortunate face on their decline – much in the way that Babe Ruth’s departure doomed Boston baseball for so long – but there has been ample time to rebound from those back-to-back game 7 losses to Atlanta in 1991 and 1992.
In the time since the Pirates’ primary distinction is claiming the title for the longest streak of losing seasons in North American sports history. Forget about division titles. The Pirates weren’t able to finish over .500 one time from 1993 to 2012.
Pittsburgh fans finally had something to cheer for in 2013 when Clint Hurdle’s club broke through with 94 wins and a wild card berth. They even won that first playoff game against the division rival Cincinnati Reds and pushed another rival – the Cardinals – to five games in the NLDS. The club followed its star outfield of Andrew McCutchen, Starling Marte, and Gregory Polanco to two more wild card berths in the following two seasons. Unfortunately, they were unable to get more than one playoff game in either of those years.
After finishing over .500 again in 2018, last season brought on a complete reset. Most of the organizations’ management turned over, and the remaining faces of those competitive clubs – Hurdle, Marte – were also sent packing. The organization is now in the hands of GM Ben Cherington, but they’re facing a complete philosophical overhaul. While they have talent, they’re not an easy club to put a timeline on returning to contention. Not until they put together a pitching staff with a more effective (and less pugilistic) philosophy. The division isn’t dominated by one team like the current AL West, but the Cardinals build a winner year after year, and the Cubs and Brewers aren’t far off in terms of their recent consistency.
Looking ahead, a shortened season in 2020 could open the window for a bizarre sort of division champ. All hope is not lost. On the whole, however, I don’t think there are a lot of pundits who would pick any of the Rockies, Marlins, or Pirates to breakthrough next season. Still, it’s bound to happen one day, right? All three teams will work to end their respective droughts, and in the meantime, thank goodness for the wild card.
(Poll link for app users.)
Which fanbase suffered the most over their teams' division title drought?
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Pirates 67% (3,921)
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Marlins 18% (1,064)
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Rockies 15% (859)
Total votes: 5,844
(Poll link for app users.)
Which team will be the first to break through and win their division?
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Rockies 37% (1,952)
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Marlins 33% (1,702)
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Pirates 30% (1,561)
Total votes: 5,215
Clint Hurdle Retires From Managing
Nov. 13: Hurdle says he has indeed decided not to seek in-uniform positions, as Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports. But that doesn’t mean he’s through with the game. Hurdle says he has spoken with organizations about front-office possibilities, so it seems likely he’ll remain engaged in some capacity.
Nov. 12: Longtime major league manager Clint Hurdle has decided to retire, according to Kevin Acee of the San Diego Union-Tribune. The Padres interviewed Hurdle for their hitting coach vacancy, but he decided not to pursue the opportunity, per Acee.
The 62-year-old Hurdle’s just a few weeks removed from the end of a lengthy tenure as the Pirates’ manager. The team fired Hurdle in late September after a disastrous season in which it went 69-93. It was the fourth straight non-playoff season for the Hurdle-led Pirates, though they did have success earlier in his run. Pittsburgh went to the playoffs in each season under Hurdle from 2013-15, but it never won a playoff series. Hired prior to 2011, Hurdle oversaw Pirates teams that went a combined 735-720-1 – which is plenty respectable for a low-budget franchise that has largely struggled over the past few decades.
Before joining the Pirates, Hurdle managed the Rockies to a 534-625 mark from 2002-09. The Rockies only made the playoffs once in that span, in 2007, but they did win the NL pennant that year before falling to the Red Sox in the World Series.
Long before his managerial career started, Hurdle was an outfielder/infielder/catcher for the Royals, Reds, Mets and Cardinals from 1977-87. Hurdle hit a solid .259/.341/.403 across 1,596 plate appearances. Now, if Hurdle’s decades-long stay in the majors truly is up, MLBTR wishes him the best in retirement.
Managerial Rumors: Ausmus, Ross, Pirates
For those who are waiting with bated breath for the ousting of their favorite team’s manager, Angels skipper Brad Ausmus would probably advise you to ignore unconfirmed rumors. Today, Ausmus reminded Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register that his time as Detroit’s manager was marked by unfounded rumors of his impending ouster (link). “It came out that I was being fired [in 2015]. I was there for two more years.” Indeed, several major outlets reported that season that Ausmus was as good as gone from the Tigers dugout, but intervention by GM Al Avila was later said to be instrumental in the former catcher maintaining his job in the Motor City.
Besides this helpful bit of historical perspective, it’s pertinent to note that Ausmus was relaying this experience in response to questions surrounding his own, current job security with Los Angeles. When asked about rumors that the club may be looking for a managerial change in the offseason–rumors that may have stemmed from a recent Ken Rosenthal blurb–Ausmus was nothing if not succinct. “I have a contract,” he told Fletcher. “That’s the only thing I know.” Ausmus is signed through the 2021 season under a three-year contract he agreed upon just last offseason.
More notes on the game’s most hard-to-quantify uniformed role…
- Former catcher David Ross is already a permanent figure in Cubs postseason lore–but could he become a regular fixture in their dugout in 2020? If Ross’ comments on ESPN this evening–as relayed by Jesse Rogers–are any indication, it sure sounds like he would have any interest in the now-vacant Chicago managerial position (Twitter link). “I think it’s one of the best jobs in baseball,” Ross said of the opening. “I’ve got a lot of close ties with those guys. I think the interest would be there. I think my heart is drawn to that dugout a little bit.” It’s worth noting that Ross also said his current role with ESPN does provide him with much-valued family time. At the same time, Ross’ quotes won’t do much to quell rumors tabbing him as the replacement for his former manager Joe Maddon.
- Clint Hurdle was only relieved of his post as Pirates manager this afternoon, but Rob Biertemfel of The Athletic is wasting no time in churning the gears of the managerial rumor mill (link). Although the club hasn’t yet confirmed its list of potential hires, Biertempfel has been asking “players, coaches, scouts, executives, and others in the industry” for several weeks about whom GM Neil Huntington might like to interview. Included among Biertempfel’s suggestions are former Rangers skipper Jeff Banister, Twins bench coach Derek Shelton, and White Sox minor league manager Omar Vizquel. Interestingly, Biertempfel summarily dispenses with any notion of Pittsburgh bringing in Joe Maddon, as the reporter believes that Maddon’s salary demands will be a non-starter for the small-market Pirates.