It’s not often that the Shorebirds make news during the off-season, but one of Salisbury’s favorite adopted sons will get his opportunity to manage his hometown team. Ryan Minor will be the team’s fourth manager in the last four seasons and the only coach retained by Delmarva. 2009 manager Orlando Gomez and pitching coach Blaine Beatty both move up to the same roles at Frederick.
Joining Minor on staff will be longtime Oriole Mike Devereaux as the hitting coach and Troy Mattes to handle the pitchers. Ironically, both Minor and Mattes are former Shorebirds – Ryan played here for the 1997 championship season while Mattes was an original 1996 Shorebird as a farmhand of the old Montreal Expos.
Mattes moves up from Bluefield, where he mentored their pitching staff for the last three years. Devereaux is expected to work heavily with the outfielders on their defense, which leads me to believe Xavier Avery might be back in 2010.
While we’re 14 weeks out from the season opener and probably 13 1/2 weeks away from finding out the roster, the 15th season for the Shorebirds promises to be an exciting one.
