{"id":108913,"date":"2025-10-28T01:00:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-28T05:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=108913"},"modified":"2025-10-28T01:00:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T05:00:14","slug":"report-pirates-hiring-world-series-champion-pitching-coach-bill-murphy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/10\/28\/report-pirates-hiring-world-series-champion-pitching-coach-bill-murphy\/","title":{"rendered":"Report: Pirates Hiring World Series Champion Pitching Coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Pirates will hire Bill Murphy, who held the same position with the Houston Astros, as their pitching coach. Chandler Rome of The Athletic broke the news, based on several sources.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_108920\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-108920\" style=\"width: 929px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-108920\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-300x194.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"929\" height=\"601\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-300x194.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-1024x661.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-768x496.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-1536x992.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/USATSI_18646045_168400885_lowres-2048x1322.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 929px) 100vw, 929px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-108920\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Jul 6, 2022; Houston, Texas, USA; Houston Astros pitching coach Bill Murphy (95) talks with starting pitcher Cristian Javier (53) while the Astros bat against the Kansas City Royals in the fourth inning at Minute Maid Park. Mandatory Credit: Thomas Shea-USA TODAY Sports<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>Report: Pirates Hire Pitching Coach Bill Murphy<\/h2>\n<p>Murphy, 36, had been the Astros\u2019 pitching coach since their World Series championship season of 2022. From 2022-25, he reigned over a staff that posted the lowest ERA and the second-highest strikeouts per nine innings in the majors. \u00a0He had been with the Astros organization in various roles since 2016 and ascended to the majors in 2021 as an assistant pitching coach. He would have known Pirates manager <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/managers\/kellydo01.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Don Kelly<\/a>, who was also with Houston in 2019, although Kelly was the first base coach with the major league club while Murphy was in the minors. Murphy also has a history with <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/11\/13\/pirates-hire-brent-strom\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">former Pirates assistant pitching coach<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/s\/strombr01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-10-27_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Brent Strom<\/a>. Strom was the Astros\u2019 pitching coach from 2014-21. Murphy has never pitched professionally, although he has experience playing Division I college baseball.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Longtime Astros pitching coach Bill Murphy is leaving the team for a job with the Pittsburgh Pirates, sources tell <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheAthletic?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@TheAthletic<\/a>. Full story &#8211; <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/E7qvEMYguA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/E7qvEMYguA<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Chandler Rome (@Chandler_Rome) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Chandler_Rome\/status\/1982964853636772219?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">October 28, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>It strikes one as somewhat odd that Murphy would leave the perennial contender Astros for the perpetual cellar-dwelling Pirates. However, three coaches have already been fired from Astros manager <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/managers\/espadjo99.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Joe Espada<\/a>\u2019s staff since their season ended. Perhaps Murphy read the writing on the wall. So much for the popular narrative among Pirates fans that \u201cnobody wants to work for the Pirates.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then again, it\u2019s no more odd than the Pirates <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/09\/30\/sources-pirates-fire-oscar-marin-other-coaches\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">dismissing their former pitching coach<\/a> Oscar Marin after their pitching excelled in 2025. The Pirates had one of the best pitching staffs in the majors in 2025. The staff recorded a 3.76 team ERA, 3.83 FIP, and 1.216 WHIP, while leading the majors with 19 shutouts. It later came to light that during their season exit interviews, numerous Pirates pitchers expressed their belief that they hadn\u2019t progressed as much as they should have. Murphy\u2019s new gig gives him an opportunity to work with likely National League Cy Young Award winner <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/s\/skenepa01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-10-27_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Paul Skenes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>The Last Word<\/h3>\n<p>Getting one of the most highly regarded young coaches in the game in Murphy is a feather in Kelly\u2019s cap. Murphy marks Kelly\u2019s first coaching hire for 2026. It\u2019s not the first time Kelly has hired a coach, however, as he <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2025\/05\/16\/pirates-former-manager-lamont\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">brought in<\/a> former manager <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/l\/lamonge01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-10-27_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gene Lamont<\/a> last summer to serve as a special assistant. Kelly still needs to fill the assistant pitching and third base coach vacancies.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo Credit: \u00a9 Kirby Lee-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Pittsburgh Pirates will hire Bill Murphy, who held the same position with the Houston Astros, as their pitching coach. Chandler Rome of The Athletic broke the news, based on several sources. Report: Pirates Hire Pitching Coach Bill Murphy Murphy, 36, had been the Astros\u2019 pitching coach since their World Series championship season of 2022. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5010,"featured_media":108919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26,1071,35],"tags":[29173,28961,1731,6371],"class_list":["post-108913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pirates","category-mlb","category-news","tag-bill-murphy","tag-don-kelly","tag-joe-espada","tag-paul-skenes"],"modified_by":"Lewis Masella, Site Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5010"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108913"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108921,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108913\/revisions\/108921"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}