Guardians lose hitting coach Valaika to Reds

CLEVELAND -- Entering the offseason, the Guardians had a good idea that, because of their success, a few of their coaches may be heading to other organizations. Chris Valaika was the first to make his move.

The Guardians announced that Valaika, Cleveland’s hitting coach for the past three seasons, was hired to be the director of hitting and Major League hitting coach for the Reds on Thursday afternoon. Now, Cleveland will have to start the process of finding his replacement.

Valaika will be reunited with a familiar face in Terry Francona in Cincinnati. Although there is speculation of what will happen with Guardians pitching coach Carl Willis this offseason (especially because of his close relationship with Francona), the Reds already having a pitching coach and a director of pitching, making it much harder to envision Willis joining Francona. Time will tell this winter if Willis ends up deciding to retire, which will create another vacancy on the coaching staff.

The one the Guardians can start working to fill is their hitting coach. They have Dan Puente, who was the assistant hitting coach to Valaika this season. Junior Betances is the Triple-A Columbus hitting coach and already has a tremendous relationship with José Ramírez, considering he threw to Ramírez in the 2022 and '24 Home Run Derby.

But maybe it’s time for Guardians manager Stephen Vogt to fill out his own staff. When signing up for this position last offseason, Vogt knew that this team largely already had its coaching staff in place. Now, he may take advantage of the opportunity of reaching out to people in his network to choose who will stand beside him in 2025.

For now, Valaika is the only coach to replace this winter. Rumors are already swirling about bench coach Craig Albernaz possibly taking a managerial job elsewhere. So, the Guardians know there may be more holes to fill. They just have to wait to see.