In the fall of 2022, Kansas City was knee-deep in the interview process, having whittled a list of more than 80 potential managerial candidates to five finalists who would undergo extensive in-person evaluations.
J.J. Picollo was mere weeks into taking over as Kansas City’s top baseball decision maker. This, he knew, he had to get right. What Picollo wanted wasn’t necessarily someone he knew or had worked with, often the case in professional baseball hirings. For Kansas City to truly transform, it had to get uncomfortable.
“J.J. said, ‘I want someone who will challenge us, who has a different way of thinking,’” recalled assistant general manager Scott Sharp. “Because he wanted us to be thinking differently, too.”
Matt Quatraro was the second in-person interview the Royals conducted. His pedigree, as a bench coach from the forward-thinking Rays, was intriguing. Quatraro had been a professional player who got to Triple A but never made it to the big leagues, working his way up as a coordinator in Tampa Bay’s player development system instead. Before he became Kevin Cash’s right hand man, Quatraro spent time on Terry Francona’s big-league staff in Cleveland. He’d pore over media guides, geek out over strategy and form relationships with everyone in the organization.
“For me, it’s like ‘Hi, how are you?’ and it stops there,” Cash said. “For Q, it’s ‘Hi, how are you, and here’s a follow up letter six months and a year later.’”
In Kansas City, candidates worked through three scenarios under different time constraints. One involved trade scenarios, another putting a lineup or roster together, and the third a game situation in which potential managers were asked how they would manage both the game and the series. There weren’t necessarily right or wrong answers.
“You’re watching how people think, instinctively, and how quickly they can react to situations,” Picollo said. “It’s impossible to replicate a game, but what Q represented was creativity and thought.”
When Quatraro was writing up his lineup on the whiteboard, he put a player second that raised eyebrows in the room. It was, Quatraro explained, to maximize that players’ at-bats against a lefty starter and anticipate the opponent’s move to the bullpen for a right-hander.
By the time Quatraro walked out, the group knew: They had their guy.
Two years later, Quatraro is still creatively mixing and matching — the Royals are not a team built on nine stars — and still doing things that make Picollo and the rest of the front office wonder. It’s not unusual for groups to gather in Quatraro’s office during the season, talking over the nine innings that just transpired and engaging in healthy debate.
That type of group dynamic is practically synonymous with Tampa Bay. There, as in Kansas City, Quatraro didn’t just want different opinions, he solicited them. Every game is a chess match, and Quatraro relishes the strategic element in using a group of 15 position players to outmaneuver opponents.
“At times, I’m watching and (thinking) what is he doing?” Picollo said. “But you got to trust it. We’re in the position we’re in, in large part because of what the players are doing, but there are games where I know decisions he made before the game came into play and ended up being why we won.”
Quatraro is an analytically-minded manager who has been bolstered by the organization’s commitment to beefing up their research and data groups and investing in more tech. The Royals hired six more people in R&D this year, including Pete Berryman, who travels with the team as a major-league analyst. Still, Royals scouts rave about Quatraro’s openness to take into account the scouting side of things, not just preaching a blend, but actually believing in one.
“We all have a tendency to get consumed with what is right in front of us, Q balances that by talking to different departments of the organization and making sure he is up to speed everywhere. And that’s not just smart, it makes people feel good,” Cash said. “He has the ability to make people feel good.”
Quatraro isn’t the type to get ejected to fire up the team or yell in a closed door meeting. He’s a calm presence, unbothered by questions about last year. “Once we got to this spring it was never a topic,” he said amid a champagne dousing in Baltimore. He’s quick to deflect any praise coming his way, though his players are eager to fill in the gaps.
“He’s a genius mind,” Bobby Witt Jr. said. “He’s been the perfect guy to lead us.”
Added pitcher Michael Wacha: “He’s a steady guy, a great communicator.”
As the Royals, who swept the Orioles in the Wild Card round, try to pull off another mammoth upset of the New York Yankees, Quatraro is never not talking strategy, or seeking information.
“I’ve got a text from him right now,” Cash said, noting that Quatraro is also his go-to text for strategy. “He’s able to see the big picture on things and not be consumed with the day-to-day inconsistencies of this job. I think that’s what makes him such a good manager. It’s very easy to get impatient in this line of work, and Q is as patient as anybody I’ve ever been around.”
Cash said he gives a lot of credit to Picollo for not making “the sexy decision” and hiring a big name or flashy up-and-comer. The 50-year-old Quatraro had interviewed at a handful of other places and came up short.
“I’ve learned a lot from him,” Picollo said, “in terms of roster construction and lineup management. We aren’t the same team we were in April. He’s had to adjust the way he manages for different iterations of our team. And he’s always been up to that challenge.”
The Royals are hoping there’s still plenty more October challenges.
(Photo of Quatraro: Harry How / Getty Images)
