David

Ross

The Padres had believed that they had whittled their list of candidates down to three — until Ross was let go when the Cubs unexpectedly hired Craig Counsell away from the Brewers on Monday morning. Now, there’s a chance that he’ll interview for the Padres’ gig and be lumped in with Mike Shildt, Benji Gil and Ryan Flaherty as the candidates for the opening. Look for the manager carousel to continue throughout the week.

Ross, who is being replaced by Craig Counsell, had one guaranteed year left on his contract. It’s unclear if the Cubs offered him another position in the organization, but he’s definitely departing now, and it’s possible the Angels, Astros or Padres could give him a look. The 46-year-old was 262-284 in four seasons with the Cubs.

The move is now official. Kelly gets the nod to take over as the Cubs’ hitting coach after Greg Brown left manager David Ross’s staff at the conclusion of the regular season. He’ll be joined by Jim Adduci, who has been promoted to an assistant hitting coach role for the 2023 season.

Meghan Montemurro of the Chicago Tribune adds that minor league hitting coordinator Dustin Kelly has been promoted to take his place. Brown served just one season in the hitting coach role after a stint as minor league hitting coordinator with the Rays. The Cubs have had plenty of upheaval with their hitting coach position over the past decade and will hope to find a steady voice with Kelly. Chicago was tied for 17th in MLB with a .698 OPS in 2022.

Thompson was handed a three-game suspension after the league ruled that he intentionally threw at Brewers’ designated hitter Andrew McCutchen during Saturday’s game. He’ll remain eligible to pitch until a ruling is made in the next few days. Chicago manager David Ross will serve his one-game suspension on Tuesday afternoon.

The Cubs won the National League Central during the abbreviated 2020 season with a 34-26 record before finishing 20 games under .500 in 2021. The team doesn’t look like a contender on paper for 2022, although their signing of Marcus Stroman and reported interest in Carlos Correa could certainly at least make them competitive. The Cubs also announced some switches in coaching assignments Friday, with Mike Napoli moving to first base coach and Craig Driver to game strategy and catching coach.

This was an expected move which has finally become official. It’s a completely new look for the Cubs, as Greg Brown was recently hired as hitting coach after a couple of years in the Rays organization. As for Washington, he most recently served as a hitting coach for the Hanwha Eagles in the Korea Baseball Organization, but worked for the Padres for five seasons prior to his stint overseas.

The 35-year-old Moskos comes from the Yankees, where he was the pitching coach for the team’s Double-A affiliate. This will be a new role under pitching coach Tommy Hottovy.

Washington will replace Chris Valaika, who served as the club’s assistant hitting coach last season, and was recently hired away by Cleveland. He will work closely with new hitting coach Greg Brown on manager David Ross’s staff next season.

Brown, 41, has spent the last two seasons as the Rays minor-league hitting coordinator. He previously was the head coach at Division II Nova Southeastern University for nine seasons from 2010 until 2019. He was an area scout with the Astros prior to that and wound up signing both J.D. Martinez and Enrique Hernández as part of their 2009 draft class.