Assistant hitting coach Mark Quinn leaving Orioles

By Roch Kubatko

Orioles

November 03, 2016, 1:15pm

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Assistant hitting coach Mark Quinn is leaving the Orioles after one season with the club, according to a baseball source.

Quinn, an outfielder who played for the Royals between 1999-2002, was hired in January to work with hitting coach Scott Coolbaugh. Quinn beat out Royals minor league hitting instructor Milt Thompson, the other finalist for the position.

According to the source, Quinn will return to The Baseball School, the hitting academy he owns in Houston.

Prior to last season, Einar Diaz served as the team's assistant hitting coach, but the Orioles moved the former major league catcher to the bullpen, where he replaced bullpen catcher Rudy Arias after the 2015 season.

Quinn had been on a one-year contract with the Orioles. That deal expired on Oct. 31.

His departure means manager Buck Showalter will now need to replace three members of the coaching staff that finished the 2016 season. Pitching coach Dave Wallace and bullpen coach Dom Chiti also won't return, as both have opted to join the Braves organization in new roles.

Chiti today was named the Braves' new senior director of pitching. Wallace, who retired from his major league coaching role with the Orioles at the end of the season, took a job with the Braves as a roving pitching instructor and senior adviser.

Showalter said in his season-ending press conference that he expected to have all of his coaches from the 2016 season - with the exception of the retiring Wallace - back in 2017. Now he has three positions to fill.