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Joe McEwing will serve as Bench Coach for the 2023 season, replacing Matt Holliday who has resigned the post.
The former #STLCards super-utility man has spent the last 15 years coaching in the White Sox organization, most recently as 3B coach and also bench coach from 2017-20. pic.twitter.com/JiQij3ZlZI
— St. Louis Cardinals (@Cardinals) January 12, 2023
Apparently he had second thoughts about the time commitment.
Also announced: Daniel Nicolaisen is added to the Major League coaching staff as the third hitting coach. Patrick “Packy” Elkins is responsible for gameday duties, planning for both hitting and pitching.
I wasn’t aware that it was possible to turn in a resignation for a job before the first day on the job.
The local StL. paper indicated Holliday kind of got caught in between taking the bench coach job and the thought of missing his kids. Not at all unlike he got caught in between on his indecision on the E-7 in LF at Dodger Stadium during the 9th inning of game 2 of the ’09 NLDS.
Super Joe is somewhat exciting, but I was really happy with Holiday returning.
Interestingly, Super Joe had his super season on the same team with Tyrone Horne (of the four-homer fame) at AA Little Rock (if my memory serves me correctly). Perhaps he can share some advice with Gomez and Redmond on how to capitalize on success like he did and Horne did not.
Spoiler alert:McEwing:”Stop striking out.”Just two months after becoming the bench coach of the #stlcards, Matt Holliday had second thoughts. His replacement is former Cardinal and long-time White Sox coach Joe McEwing. Coaching assignments changed for Packy Elkins and Daniel Nicolaisen. (free) https://t.co/NXLm1fxXBS pic.twitter.com/fuQK9aJHhq
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) January 12, 2023
Its already coming apart like a cheap suit. But McEwing is a good choice. He can explain real life baseball to Ollie.
It’s kind of a buzzkill but getting McEwing is a solid plan b. They must have known about Matt for a few days to line up the announcement.
Why would anyone assume this has anything to do with Marmol? If you want go the conspiracy theory route you could always say it is philosophical differences with the front office.
Or perhaps we could stick with the most likely and actually reported explanation, which is Holliday decided the time commitment away from his family was more than he wanted to do.
“Why would anyone assume this has anything to do with Marmol?”
Probably because until the hiring of Ollie Marmol it was exceedingly rare for Cardinal coaches to leave the organization of their own volition, unless of course it was for a promotion. Or retirement.
We’ve now had three in a few months. Maybe as many as in the previous 30-40 years? I have no idea how much if anything Marmol had to do with any of the three departures, but there’s nothing illogical or conspiratorial about suggesting it. If he had nothing to do with any of them, then it’s a rather enormous coincidence. (And there are big and small coincidences.)
None of us enjoy the fact that the vast majority of things happen for multiple reasons. It makes the world too messy, but that’s how it is. And because I don’t believe in big coincidences very much, I’m pretty sure that the manager had something to do with at least one of the trio of departures — not that any of the three will necessarily hurt the team, mind you.
I am not big on coincidences either but there is still zero actual evidence that Marmol was the reason that Holliday, Maddux, and Albert left. For all we know it could have been because of Mo or Girsch or philosophical differences or any other reason.
Speaking of a recent uptick in organizational turnover, from 1980-2011 the Cardinals had a grand total of three managers (not including interims). We are now on our third manager since the middle of 2018. Perhaps Ollie is not the only reason for people leaving the club.
I was surprised Matt took the job to begin with. Him resigning adds up for me. Must have passed by his luggage last week and thought “you know what….”
For no reason I can prove, I think McEwing will make a really good bench coach.
LaRussa loved him and if I recall kept a pair of his cleats after JM’s last season with the Cardinals?
I like Joe McEwing a lot. He was fun to watch when he came up to the big leagues like a house of fire ala Bo Hart. It wasn’t sustainable but it was fun while it lasted. He was Little Mac opposite of Big Mac.
LaRussa did indeed think very highly of him so that is a good endorsement. He may someday follow the long line of Cardinal bench coaches becoming a manager.
McEwing seems like another Skip, which is good, but only so good. There was nothing Skip could do, or at least did do, to head off the field management aspects of the wild card debacle.
We got bounced due to field management and nothing else. Pitching issues were due to pitchers with physical/mechanical issues being trotted out there when alternatives were available. The failure of the big middle of the order boppers to produce, when they had been all year, was, IMO, due to the lineup around them being suddenly changed. That is something that baseball professionals know matters in real life even if it doesn’t in the computer simulations. Who is hitting before and after effects what you see from the pitcher and defense and well as affecting the batters psychology up there. Skip would have been fully aware of that. So would Albert and Maddox. So will McEwing, but it won’t matter 2023 just like it didn’t matter in 2022. Marmol is no dummy. He will have learned if he did not already know. But that will not matter either if he wants to keep his job.
I don’t think Goldy and NA choked if that’s what you are getting at. But I don’t think they were properly prepared for the different looks they would see with the unfamiliar lineup.
We have analyzed that series about 10,000 times but might as well again I suppose since not much else is going on in January.
Yes, the offense choked. Goldy and Arenado were 1st and 3rd in the MVP race then went 1 for 15 in the playoffs. That is bad even if they were hitting 8th and 9th in the lineup. I didn’t agree with hitting Pujols 2nd and Donovan 5th but MVP type players need to put on their big boy pants when it is playoff time, as does the manager. There were several people on the field and in the dugout who didn’t perform. Blaming it all on the manager is a cop out.
Arenado hasn’t been good in his limited playoff experience. Goldy was sucking wind for the last 6 weeks or so of the regular season. Choked maybe. But managing of the bullpen was a choke job.
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