3 reasons why the KC Royals won't fire Matt Quatraro

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Sunday's 5-2 victory over New York brought the curtain down on a distressing KC Royals season. There will be no club curtain call or celebration of a job well done. Not for this team, which Saturday evening tied the 2005 club's franchise record for most losses (106) in a season.

The 2023 campaign's end also means Matt Quatraro, the man general manager J.J. Picollo hired to manage his team after firing Mike Matheny a year ago, has much to think about this winter. "Troubled" is, thanks to those 106 losses, a fitting description of Quatraro's first go-round as a big league skipper — Matheny never oversaw so many losses in a season; nor did Trey Hillman, Tony Muser or, although he twice came close, Ned Yost. And it took the combined efforts of Tony Peña Sr., Bob Schaefer, and Buddy Bell to lose 106 times in 2005.

Dropping so many games typically damages major league managers' careers and puts them squarely on the proverbial hot seat. Is that where Quatraro should find himself after this season? Will Picollo fire him and find someone else to guide the Royals on the field?

No. Quatraro was never on the hot seat, and isn't now. He's set for 2024.

Here's why.

The KC Royals won't fire Matt Quatraro after only one season

Although there are other reasons Picollo won't send his manager packing (more on those in a moment), that Quatraro has just a season on the job is perhaps the most fundamental. One year managing a bad (albeit recently improving) club simply isn't a true test. Quatraro deserves, and will get, more time to prove himself.

Next reason?

The 2023 season was never going to be a good one for the KC Royals

Kansas City didn't give Quatraro a team with which he could sustain success. Instead, the club dedicated itself to what Picollo often referred to as an "evaluation season", an honest but not-so-subtle signal that winning regularly wasn't in the cards.

The team's candid concession helps explain why Quatraro was never expected to win this season, and why he won't be punished for losing. By design, 2023 was a campaign for observing, studying, and scrutinizing players; determining who could, and couldn't, help the Royals build and galvanize what Picollo fondly refers to as a "core" was paramount.

As a consequence, Picollo didn't spend last winter loading the roster with expensive, uber-talented new players. Yes, he added a few new faces, sold Ryan O'Hearn's contract to Baltimore before the season started and let Hunter Dozier go after it did, but younger, less-established Royals with long-term potential were clearly a priority.

And Picollo ultimately enhanced the future by trading performing players primarily for prospects — gone by the time the trade deadline expired, for example, were Aroldis Chapman to Texas, Scott Barlow to San Diego, Nicky Lopez to the Braves, and Ryan Yarbrough to the Dodgers. Playing greener players more often became the norm.

So it was, then, that Quatraro's Royals weren't very good. They were never designed to be, and he won't be fired for not winning with such a club.

KC Royals skipper Matt Quatraro is a managerial work in progress

For reasons already stated, no one, especially Quatraro, should be angry that he didn't lead the Royals to the World Series, a division title, or even something better than their last-place finish in the American League Central. The Royals simply didn't provide him with the tools to accomplish any of those things. And his eyes were open when he took the Kansas City job. He knew what the Royals were and were not, and precisely what he was getting into.

Everyone also knew the rookie manager would experience growing pains; due in great part to the evaluation-oriented approach the Royals chose for this season, he certainly did. Learning to manage with a good club is hard enough; doing it with an inferior team is, of course, even more difficult.

Quatraro is Picollo's choice to spearhead the club's development plan on the field and in the clubhouse, much like Ned Yost was former GM Dayton Moore's 2010 selection for a similar assignment with another bad Royals club. Although Yost had big league managing experience when hired, he was still maturing as a skipper and, when equipped with the young core the Royals had been developing, ultimately won a couple of American League pennants and a World Series.

Whether Quatraro will succeed in Kansas City remains to be seen, but he probably will. He just needs the better roster Picollo appears willing to provide, and a little more experience. He'll be back for both in 2024.

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