The Pirates will be adding Mendy Lopez to their big league coaching staff, according to Antonio Puesan, digital marketing director for the Toros del Este club in the Dominican Winter League (Twitter link). Lopez isn’t replacing anyone on the Pirates’ current staff, but Jason Mackey of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette tweets that Lopez will be focusing on infield coaching duties. Bench coach Don Kelly frequently works with the Bucs’ infielders, but he’ll now have one less duty on his plate with Lopez joining the coaching ranks.
Lopez joins a Major League staff for the first time, after working as the hitting coach with Pittsburgh’s lower A-ball affiliate. The 49-year-old previously spent four seasons as the Pirates’ field coordinator in Latin America, as well as three seasons as a manager with the Pirates’ Dominican Summer League squad.
Fans may best remember Lopez from his playing days, as he spent seven seasons in the majors from 1998-2004. Most of that time was spent with the Royals, but Lopez also spent parts of two seasons in Pittsburgh, suiting up for 25 games with the Bucs in 2001-02. Lopez’s playing career extended well beyond his time in the majors, as he also played with the KBO League’s Samsung Lions in 2004, and then with multiple Mexican League teams from 2006-13.
I completely forgot that Mendy played for the Bucs, not that you can blame me.
But since it is his first time on the MLB squad, he was told that his first year will be an internship…no pay, but they’ll cover 1/2 of his travel expenses….
I think they told him he could nibble at the post-game spread if there are any left-overs too…He has to wait till the players get seconds though..
Look forward to a much better infield for the Bucs in 2023. Balls may never get through ever again.
I saw Shelton manage a few games , thought for sure he either had money on the opposition, or was going for 1st pick overall.
Looks like it was the first one , as now he had some extra pocket money for the always asked for , another coach. Certainly FO wasn’t gonna add any $$$ lmao
This guy will have one of the toughest jobs in MLB with some of the infielders on this team.
He should just tell them to watch Kevin Newman.
Hayes was a gold glove finalist. He’s probably the bright spot defensively in that infield patch work. Offensively, Pirates are like the 50s-60s offensively.
He will just have to be taught not to have a meal during an ongoing play.
Are you that out of touch with Hayes? The guy had a better year defensively than Arenado (who won the gold glove). Unless your a Cubs or Cardinals fan who just love to harass us Pirates fans and have no clue what’s going on with the team besides a negative record.
Pirates-Are you a dips**t?Hayes was part of history whereby he was actually eating sunflower seeds on the field during an on going play.
This is an historic first.
It was an embarrassment to all true Pirate fans,even more so than Castro losing his cell phone during a play.
It shows the lack of professionalism and knowledge of basics that this team has.
And who are you to say that you know more than the people voting on Gold Gloves?
Who is the one without a clue?
It’s simple metrics and you follow the logics and numbers. Hayes had a very solid defensive year and it WAS better than Armando. Don’t be so clueless because of 1 play Hayes made a mistake on. I didn’t realize 1 play is a deciding factor on winning a recognizing award such as Gold Glove. If that is the case, then some should lose their gold glove rights for a botched catch or something ridiculous like Hayes falling asleep eating sunflower seeds. Hayes was robbed of the Gold Glove and the award went to a winning team as always. It’s not about the best overall defensive player. Any player that wins a gold glove or any type of award, is usually on a winning club. That goes for RoY honors as well. But Pirates will always be overlooked by those writers who vote for these awards. Win or lose, there is zero recognition to teams like Pirates, Royals, or even Twins. It’s a biased sport that is based off of fan base support and made for larger markets. Traditional ways are dead.
(1)You don’t have to school me on small market vs big market teams.One WS title in 31 years says it all.
(2) I do not doubt that larger market winning teams players get the benefit of the doubt
(3)I think that the reigning winner gets the nod in a tight contest much like in boxing
(4) many voters probably go for the known leader at the position
(5)Hayes needs to show more professionalism in my mind,and chewing sunflower seeds during a play is not the way to do it.This can sometimes happen when someone very young gets a big contract that sets them for life.
(6]I do not know much about your fielding statistics but I do know that they are not nearly as accurate as hitting statistics and therefore do not show nearly the entire picture like you think that they do
(7) If Hayes is as great as you say he should have plenty of chances to win gold glove awards.He should be much more worried about becoming as complete of an overall player as he can be in order to earn his money instead of being a crybaby about this year’s award.
Poor guy will probably get minimum wage from the Pirates. Is there a minimum MLB coaches must be paid?
Better to underpay from the pirates than to overpay like the loser dodgers
Loser Dodgers? They spend money and try to win. The Pirates owner hoards money and tries to lose. Would you like to trade places?
They fail to win in the post season…LOSERS
Any team with a 200 million payroll and can’t win when it counts….LOSERS, and this includes the Yankees
Does he have any championship experience?