The Pirates will hire Rangers hitting coach and former Rockies manager Clint Hurdle, Jon Heyman reports. They will announce the hiring tomorrow. Ken Rosenthal says Hurdle's contract will be for three years.
Again, here's a look at what we can expect. Hurdle makes strange tactical decisions, but then it seems that most managers do, and is apparently a strong teacher of fundamentals - although we'll see how long that reputation lasts if the Pirates continue to give their managers so little to work with. Still, it's hard not to feel a little underwhelmed here: yes, the Pirates got a guy with experience, but his experience includes only one winning season, and then getting fired and outperformed by a terrible manager in Jim Tracy. To be fair, though, this is a spot where the Pirates really can't win. If they pick one of the available guys with big-league experience, they're probably going to be getting someone who got fired. If they pick one without experience, well, they just picked a guy without experience. To some extent, we probably have to trust the Pirates for a while on this one; the hiring and firing of managers is an inexact science, and the Bucs clearly got who they really wanted.