Report: Yankees Hiring Matt Blake To Be New Pitching Coach

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The Yankees search for a new pitching coach has apparently come to an end.

According to a report from ESPN’s Jeff Passan, the Yankees are hiring Matt Blake to take over the role that was vacated when Larry Rothschild was dismissed. Blake has spent the last few years as a member of the Cleveland Indians organization.

YES Network analyst David Cone had interviewed for the job, as had a few other candidates, but the Yankees are reportedly going with Blake after a relatively quick process.

His work has been mostly behind the scenes, but Blake has been a big part of the pitching structure in Cleveland over the past few seasons. The Indians have had success in developing pitchers in their farm system before bringing them up to the big leagues. 

It’s unclear what the staff that Blake will be working with will look like. The Yankees have been linked heavily to Gerrit Cole, whose contract expired after this past season with the Astros. There could be a few additions to the starting rotation and the bullpen as the team makes a concerted effort to improve its pitching.

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Being a pitching coach for a Major League Baseball team is a big step up for Blake in a short amount of time. As recently as 2015 he was the pitching coach at Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School, a baseball powerhouse in the suburbs of Boston. He made a name for himself in New England by working with Eric Cressey of Cressey Sports Performance.

Rothschild had been the Yankees pitching coach since 2011, but he took a bit of criticism for how he managed the bullpen and for being a bit more “old school” than other pitching coaches around the league. Blake is further evidence that the Yankees want to move more into the modern day pitching management system that is based mostly on analytics.