Kansas City Royals: 3 qualities needed from next manager

3. He must have a hands-on teaming approach.

The Kansas City Royals already have a guy on their staff who would fit all three of these elements in Pedro Grifol. The 49-year old currently serves as the team’s quality control and catching coach. He was the high school baseball player of the year in the state of Florida in 1988 and played 9 seasons in Major League Baseball.

Grifol’s name has been mentioned as being a potential candidate to fill Yost’s shoes and to kind of wrap this whole piece up, he’s exactly who they should be targeting. I understand fans are clamoring for new owner John Sherman to think outside the box, or outside the organization, but Grifol seems like a perfect fit.

The Athletic has a great piece on him that exemplifies everything the Royals would want in their next manager:

"“Each day, Grifol and Soler sit down and prepare for the day’s opposing pitcher. Each day, Grifol works with Perez during his Tommy John surgery rehab. Each day, Grifol slaps grounders to Adalberto Mondesi at shortstop (when Mondesi is healthy). Grifol values those relationships, among so many others he has with folks inside the Royals’ organization. “I feel extremely attached,” Grifol said. “I’ve been here for seven years. I saw the start of the World Series run. I didn’t go through the bumps on the road with the other group, but I saw the start of it. We saw it through. And I saw it start again.” – The Athletic"

Certainly, the Royals should look outside the organization but Yost himself stated that he hopes the next hire comes from within the organization. Perhaps he has Grifol in mind as a successor but that will ultimately be up to John Sherman.

Grifol has come up recently as a finalist for the Tigers and Orioles managerial position in 2017 and 2018, respectively. He’s well respected in this league and has the three qualities that the Royals would need to get this team headed in the right direction.