The Dodgers on Tuesday announced the hiring of hitting coach Pedro Guerrero, filling the vacancy left by Aaron Bates’ somewhat surprising departure last week.
Guerrero notably is not the former Dodgers All-Star from the 1980s, though both are from San Pedro de Macoris in the Dominican Republic. This Guerrero was born on December 3, 1988, nearly four months after the hitting machine of the same name was traded by the Dodgers to the St. Louis Cardinals for pitcher John Tudor.
This Guerrero was originally
an infielder signed by the Dodgers in 2006, and played eight years in the minors. He played two games in Triple-A Albuquerque in 2010 and once for Double-A Chattanooga but otherwise his minor league playing days was High-A and below before retiring as a player after 2013.
In 2016, Guerrero began his coaching career at rookie-level Ogden, a team that included first-round draft picks Will Smith and Gavin Lux playing their first professional games, plus other future major leaguers Keibert Ruiz, Luke Raley, Cody Thomas, and DJ Peters.
Baseball, like many industries, is built on relationships. Guerrero after two years in Ogden was hired as an assistant hitting coach in 2018 by the Philadelphia Phillies under new manager Gape Kapler, who was the Dodgers director of player development from 2015-17. Guerrero was the youngest coach in the majors at age 29 in 2016, and coached four years in Philadelphia before getting hired by Kapler as assistant hitting coach of the San Francisco Giants in 2022. Guerrero moved on as hitting coach of the Miami Marlins, where he coached the last two years under manager Clayton McCullough, the former Dodgers minor league field coordinator during Guerrero’s playing and coaching days in the system.
Another first-time 27-year-old coach on that 2016 Ogden staff was former minor league catcher Austin Chubb, who is now the Dodgers minor league field coordinator.
Guerrero, who turns 38 in December, now comes to the Dodgers with eight seasons of major league coaching experience under his belt, and joins a coaching staff that is expected to otherwise be the same as last season, including fellow hitting coach Robert Van Scoyoc, who turns 40 next Monday and has eight years of major league coaching experience of his own in Los Angeles plus prior consulting work.
