Orioles add familiar names to 2025 coaching staff

As Brandon Hyde prepares for his seventh season as Orioles manager, he again has revamped his coaching staff. In Hyde’s successful run, the Orioles have had three different pitching coaches, and now three different hitting coaches.

Ryan Fuller and Matt Borgschulte were co-hitting coaches, and they’ve been replaced by Cody Asche, whose elevation from offensive strategist was officially announced by the Orioles on Monday.

After this past season’s poor offensive performance in the second half and just one run scored in the two Wild Card Series losses to Kansas City, changes were expected.

The Orioles completed their 2025 staff with two moves, one surprising and one not.

Robinson Chirinos, who had a solid 11-season catching career that ended with the Orioles in 2022, is the new bench coach, replacing veteran major league manager and coach Fredi González.

Buck Britton, who has managed nearly every player on the 40-man roster during his time as a manager at Single-A Delmarva, Double-A Bowie (now Chesapeake) and for the last three seasons, Triple-A Norfolk, is the major league coach, taking over for longtime organizational stalwart José Hernández.

Chirinos’ appointment is important because without González and Hernández, the Orioles had no Spanish-speaking coach. It’s also vital because he has a good rapport with Adley Rutschman, whom he mentored after Rutschman came to the major leagues in May 2022.

While Tim Cossins, Hyde’s longtime friend and colleague, remains as major league field coordinator/catching instructor, perhaps Chirinos can help Rutschman recapture the spark he had when his big league career began after a second-half funk in 2024.

Britton’s ascension was a reward for his hard work. It was about time that after delivering good news to so many players that he gets the word that he’s finally a big leaguer. The closest Britton came to playing in the major leagues was six seasons in Triple-A with the Orioles, Dodgers and Twins.

Chirinos, 40, and Britton, 38, are significantly younger than González, who’s 60, and the 55-year-old Hernández, who played in the majors for 15 years.

Fuller, who left to become the Chicago White Sox’s director of hitting, and Borgschulte, who returns to the Minnesota Twins as a hitting coach, are both 34 but neither played in the major leagues. Fuller played just 32 games for Arizona’s Rookie League team in 2012, and Borgschulte never played professionally.

Asche and new assistants Tommy Joseph and Sherman Johnson each played in the major leagues, though Johnson’s experience was limited to 10 hitless at-bats with the Los Angeles Angels in 2018. Asche and Johnson are also 34; Joseph is 31.

Asche and Joseph played together on the Philadelphia Phillies in 2016, and Joseph spent 2024 as an assistant hitting coach with the Seattle Mariners.

Asche and Johnson worked with many of the Orioles’ young players in the minor leagues. Asche was the upper-level hitting coordinator in 2022. Johnson had that job this year, and he’ll continue in that role as well as work with major league hitters.

Johnson was frequently seen at Oriole Park later in the season.

The other coaches return. Cossins, pitching coach Drew French, his assistants, Mitch Plassmeyer and Ryan Klimek, who’s the pitching strategy coach, first base coach Anthony Sanders and third base coach Tony Mansolino. Major league development coach Grant Anders is also back.

Of the returnees, only Sanders, who also works with the outfielders, has big league experience. He had just 25 at-bats for the Blue Jays and Mariners from 1999-2001.

While there are new batting coaches, Mike Elias said that the team’s hitting philosophy won’t change.

Since Asche, Britton, Chirinos and Johnson are familiar with the roster, the presumption here is that their knowledge of the players will help get the most out of them offensively.

Notes: The Orioles signed left-handed pitcher Raúl Alcantara, outfielder Franklin Barreto and infielder Jeremiah Jackson to minor league contracts.

Barreto hit .175 in four seasons with Oakland and the Los Angeles Angels from 2017-2020, and last season, the 28-year-old hit .343 with a 1.006 OPS, 16 home runs and 63 RBIs in the Mexican League.

Alcantara played six seasons in the Seattle organization and Jackson has played six seasons with the Angels and Mets organization.

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