Associated Press November 13, 2023, 3:17 p.m. ET2 minute display
NEW YORK – James Rowson, who developed a good relationship with Aaron Judge in the minor leagues, was hired as the Yankees’ hitting coach on Monday after New York finished a season with the second-worst batting average in the major leagues.
Dillon Lawson was fired at the All-Star break after a season and a half as hitting coach, marking New York’s first coaching change of the season since Nardi Contreras replaced Billy Connors as pitching coach in July 1995. Lawson was replaced by Sean Casey, who decided he wouldn’t do it. I don’t want to return for 2024.
Rowson, 47, was Class A Tampa’s hitting coach in 2006 and 2007 and the Yankees’ minor league hitting coordinator from 2008 to 2011 and 2014 to 2016, the last three years Judge worked his way up the farm system.
Rowson left the Yankees to become the Chicago Cubs’ minor league hitting coordinator in 2012, then was promoted to major league hitting coach from June 2012 through the 2013 season. He was the Minnesota Twins’ hitting coach from 2017 to 2019 and the Miami Marlins’ bench coach from 2020 to 2022, when the team was led by former Yankees captain Don Mattingly. Rowson was the Detroit Tigers’ assistant hitting coach this year.
A native of Mount Vernon, New York, Rowson played in the minor league systems of the Seattle Mariners (1995–96) and the Yankees (1997), as well as independent ball in 1998. He coached in the Angels’ system at rookie level. Provo Plain (2002). ) and at Class A Cedar Rapids (2003) and Rancho Cucamonga (2004-05).
New York hit .227 that season, better only than Oakland’s .223 and the third-lowest mark in Yankees history behind .214 in 1968 and .225 in 1967. The Yankees missed the playoffs for the first time since 2016 and narrowly avoided the playoffs at 82-80. It would have been their first losing season since 1992.
Owner Hal Steinbrenner called the season “terrible” and general manager Brian Cashman called it “a disaster.”