Report: Matt Quartaro, Derek Shelton among favorites for Pirates manager job

Little news has come from the Pittsburgh Pirates’ restarted managerial search.

However, ESPN reported Saturday a pair of bench coaches, the Tampa Bay Rays’ Matt Quartaro and Minnesota Twins’ Derek Shelton, have emerged as the favorites.

A source confirmed to the Tribune-Review that Quartaro and Shelton are in the running of the job. However, it is unclear if they remain the last two candidates.

The search started again Tuesday, a day after Ben Cherington was hired as general manager. Clint Hurdle was fired as manager Sept. 29 on the last day of the regular season, and then-GM Neal Huntington began interviewing candidates two days later.

However, Huntington was fired Oct. 28, and the search was placed on hold. Quartaro and Shelton were two of eight people interviewed by Huntington.

Quartaro, 46, has spent the last two seasons on the Rays staff, including 2019 as bench coach. Before that, he was the Cleveland Indians hitting coach for four seasons from 2014-17.

Quartaro played for seven seasons as a catcher in the Rays farm system from 1996-2002, then spent 10 more years from 2004-13 with the organization as a minor league coach and manager, as well as the system’s hitting coordinator.

Shelton, 49, has spent the last 15 seasons as a coach in the major leagues. Before serving as the Twins bench coach the past two seasons, Shelton was the hitting coach for the Indians (2005-09) and Rays (2010-16) and the Toronto Blue Jays quality coach in 2017.

Shelton also was a minor league catcher, playing the 1992 and ‘93 seasons in the New York Yankees farm system before his career was ended by an elbow injury. He was a coach and manager in the minors with the Yankees from 1997-2002 and the Indians minor league hitting coordinator from 2003-04.