Clint Hurdle, Former Manager, Pittsburgh Pirates

Date of Birth: 7/30/1957
Birthplace: Big Rapids, Michigan

Clint Hurdle started his major league career as a player. He was drafted by the Kansas City Royals in 1975 and played with them from 1977 through 1981. He moved to the Cincinnati Reds in 1982 but stayed only one year with them. Hurdle played with the New York Mets for three seasons (1983, 1985, 1987), with a stint with the St. Louis Cardinals (1986) in between his Mets years. Hurdle played in over 60 games in only two seasons (1978, 1980) and he ended his career of 10 years having played in only 515 games with a batting average of .259. He fared better in the Venezuelan Professional Baseball League when he played there from 1977 to 1979 and again in 1983.

After ending his career as a player, Hurdle managed in the minor leagues from 1988 through 1993. In 1994, he joined the Colorado Rockies as a minor league hitting instructor, advancing to the majors in 1997 as the Rockies hitting coach. He stayed in his coaching position until 2002 when he was made manager of the Rockies.

Hurdle managed the Rockies from 2002 until the end of May, 2009 when he was fired. From 2002 through 2006, the team did not fare well under Hurdle's leadership, ending under .500 each year with fourth and fifth place finishes in the NL West division. That record changed in 2007 when the Rockies finished in second place in the division and they won the NL Wild Card. They then went on to win the NL Division series and the NL Championship series but they lost in the World Series to the Boston Red Sox. After the 2007 season, the Rockies went downhill, ending in 2008 with a 74-88 record (.457 win percentage, third place finish in NL West division) and a much worse record in the first 46 games of the 2009 season (18-28 record with .391 win percentage).

After being fired by the Rockies in 2009, Hurdle became an analyst for the MLB Network. The following year, he signed on as hitting coach for the Texas Rangers.

In 2011, Hurdle became manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates, leading them to a 72-90 record that year and a 79-83 record in 2012. Hurdle was named National League Manager of the Year in 2013 for leading the Pirates to the playoffs. The team finished the season in second place in the NL Central division with a 94-68 win-loss record. They won a Wild Card spot and defeated the Cincinnati Reds in one of the Wild Card games. They then went on to the NL division series, losing to the St. Louis Cardinals.

The Pirates, under Hurdle's leadership, again won a Wild Card spot in 2014, finishing the regular season with an 88-74 record. They lost the Wild Card game to the San Francisco Giants by a score of 8-0. They repeated that in 2015, when the team finished in second place in the NL Central division with 98 wins and 64 losses. They won a Wild Card slot but they lost the one game with a score of 4-0 to the Chicago Cubs.

The Pirates and Hurdle finished in third place in the NL Central division in 2016 with a record of 78 wins to 83 losses. They fared about the same in 2017, finishing in fourth place with a 75-87 record.

In 2018, Hurdle led the Pirate to 82 wins and 79 losses, their first winning season since 2015. After a poor season in 2019, with 69 wins and 92 losses, Hurdle was fired on September 29, 2019. He retired two months later, on November 12, 2019.

Hurdle's statistics in nine years as manager of the Pirates was 735 wins to 720 losses. His seventeen year record as a major league manager is 1,269 wins to 1,345 losses.

Sources for Information
Wikipedia - Clint Hurdle
Baseball Reference - Clint Hurdle