ORLANDO, Fla. — The bench coach is typically considered a manager’s closest confidant, the man in the dugout who points everything in the right direction. That is especially true for a first-year manager like Gabe Kapler. The conventional thinking would be to surround Kapler, who has no big-league coaching experience and managed A-ball for one season a decade ago, with a grizzled baseball man who once managed.
The Phillies, under Kapler, will usurp tradition.
They have five jobs on Kapler’s coaching staff to fill. They went for minor-league experience with the hire of Dusty Wathan as third-base coach.