The Orioles have their new manager. It’s not official yet, but it’s the next closest thing, with ESPN’s Jeff Passan reporting that the team is “finalizing a deal” to hire Craig Albernaz, currently the associate
manager of the Cleveland Guardians, as the next manager of the Orioles.
The 42-year-old Albernaz served as a bullpen and catching coach for the Giants starting in 2019 and in 2023 was hired to be the bench coach for the Guardians. Cleveland shifted his title after one season to associate manager, and now after one more season, Albernaz is shifting his title to manager with the Orioles. He has also coached in a variety of ways through the minors with the Rays, including one season as a Triple-A manager.
Albernaz has interviewed for at least one other managerial opening this offseason, having reportedly interviewed with the Nationals within the last week. Another report indicated that Albernaz’s predecessor, Brandon Hyde, had also interviewed with Washington.
The Orioles had a number of paths available to them in finding their next manager. They could have kept interim manager Tony Mansolino around if they had really wanted to. They apparently had interest enough at least to interview future Hall of Famer Albert Pujols. They could have hired someone with major league managerial experience, either successfully (ex-Mariners manager Scott Servais) or less-successfully (ex-Mets manager Luis Rojas).
They went with an up-and-comer instead, someone who has been on that future manager path for a little while. If he didn’t like the vibe of the Orioles, he probably could have held out for a better job. On the most basic level, I’d say it’s encouraging that someone with talent is choosing to hitch his wagon to these horses.
The Guardians were AL Central champions in each of the two seasons where Albernaz was there. Obviously, that’s not all because of him. I don’t think it’s crazy for fans to hope that he will be able to bring a perspective from a winning organization that’s different than what the Orioles have had going on lately.
To be determined is how much the different perspective will change the coaching staff. It would be weird to hire a new manager and not have any changes to the coaching staff. The Orioles are sometimes quite weird, so who knows, maybe they’ll do it.
It’s also quite possible that within the next few days we’ll find out the team has decided not to renew the contracts of some/all of its coaches and there will be new hires to replace those people. As you are probably well aware, the team has been substantially disappointing on offense for the past year and a half of baseball at this point.
