After a 101-win season, there are a few moves the Orioles are expected to make, and hiring a new pitching coach after promoting Chris Holt to director of pitching was one of them.
On Wednesday, per MASN’s Roch Kubatko on Twitter, it seems GM Mike Elias has found his guy, as 39-year-old Drew French, formerly the bullpen coach for the Atlanta Braves, will be the next pitching coach for the Baltimore Orioles.
French, a native of Seguin, Texas, was the bullpen coach for Atlanta from 2021-2023, his tenure there including a World Series Championship.
Before that, French worked with the Houston Astros’ Triple-A affiliate as a pitching coach and more from 2016 to 2020. Part of this time coincided with Elias being the director of scouting for that same organization.
French brings a decent bit of coaching experience, along with his relatively young age and mind to the Orioles, who have seemed to mold very well with coaches that fit that same description.
A fun fact from Nathan Ruiz of The Baltimore Sun is that this is the fourth time French has succeeded Chris Holt as a team’s pitching coach. He did it with three Astros affiliates from 2016 to 2018, and now, he will follow Holt as the Orioles’ pitching coach in 2024.
As for Holt, he is still with the club, as mentioned earlier, now as the overall director of pitching. The Orioles organization will be lucky to now have French within a staff overseen by someone like Holt, who has done great things with the O’s arms in 2023.
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