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# Three Takeaways from Mariners 2026 Coaching Staff Announcements
- URL: https://www.emeraldcityspectrum.com/three-takeaways-from-mariners-2026-coaching-staff-announcements/
- Published: 2025-12-06T00:28:26.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-08T06:16:57.000Z
- Author: Callaghan Bluechel
- Tags: News, Analysis, Mariners, Dan Wilson, Manny Acta, Kevin Seitzer, Edgar Martinez, Bobby Magallanes, Perry Hill, Danny Farquhar, Pete Woodworth, Trent Blank, Austin Nola, Jake McKinley, Carlos Cordoza, Louis Boyd, Fleming Baez, Justin Novak

[Embed from Getty Images](https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/2227650434?ref=emeraldcityspectrum.com)

Coming on the heels of a handful of staff departures following the 2025 season, the Seattle Mariners officially announced their 2026 coaching staff on the morning of Friday, Dec. 5\. Most of the faces, including manager Dan Wilson, are returners from their October campaign, but there are three new hires to fill out the dugout for the upcoming season: Austin Nola, Jake McKinley, and Carlos Cordoza.

The team’s managerial decisions, while mostly expected, do offer some insight into the organizational plan for 2026 - and as expected, it’s in the same direction as most else that has come from the organization since the most heartbreaking pitch in the city’s history.

### 1\. The Mariners aren’t looking to shake things up too much in pitching and management.

While the ultimate failure in ALCS Game 7 was the final blow in a series where the M’s had been outplayed and outscored for the previous six contests, it’s pretty clear that there’s World Series potential in the T-Mobile Park dugout, and that includes much of the coaching staff. Infield wizard Perry Hill, who consistently turned good fielders into great ones and great fielders into Gold Glove winners for years on end with Seattle, is returning to the team for his eighth season. Pitching coach Pete Woodworth is returning for his seventh year alongside assistant pitching coach Danny Farquhar for his third season and director of pitching strategy Trent Blank for his fourth.

Bench coach Manny Acta is donning Mariner blue once again, entering his fourth year in that role and 11th within the Mariners organization, and manager Dan Wilson is set to begin his second full year as skipper. Their role in the clubhouse vibes was by all indications paramount, but that also means that development in key situations - such as the disastrous bottom of the seventh in Game 7 - will have to come from within, not without.

### 2\. Seattle is sticking with the Seitzer-Martinez-Mallaganes batting troika for 2026, but they’ll have to continue upgrading the hitters in 2026.

Like the rest of the returners, the hitting coaches signal the front office’s confidence in the general game plan going into 2026, but in the case of Kevin Seitzer and company’s sophomore year, it’s a sign of the success they had in 2025\. For decades, the Mariners have vainly sought hitting coaches to squeeze the best out of the bats in the pitcher’s paradise that is T-Mobile Park, and after a dull 2024 with the lumber, Seitzer’s team appeared to garner a jump in production. The team’s OPS+ increased from 102 to 113 as ttheir strikeout rate shrunk from 26.8 percent to 23.3 percent. The team’s .244 batting average was the highest it had been since 2018.

However, there is still more to prove before Seitzer, Edgar Martinez, and assistant hitting coach Bobby Mallaganes can be given the keys to the city (well, Martinez already has them for other reasons). While the bats improved from 2024, they only slightly edged out the team’s 2023 production that had been overseen by the old coaching regime. Newcomers Cole Young and Ben Williamson, while not exceptionally poor with the stick, still struggled against big league pitching, while Dylan Moore fell off a cliff at the end of May and found himself in Arlington, Texas before season’s end. Dominic Canzone made a massive improvement, but with some serious luck on his side in 2025, the jury is still out on his development. Cal Raleigh, of course, had the greatest offensive season any catcher ever had.

With Colt Emerson and Laz Montes set to debut in 2026 (and the team by all indications putting a good degree of confidence in them), the Seitzer troika will face a sink-or-swim year. Can they help these major prospects pan out? Can they get legacy-defining improvement from Julio Rodríguez in his age-25 season? Can they iron out the guys who didn’t produce as much in 2025?

### 3\. Former Mariner catcher Austin Nola will fill Tony Arnerich’s role as bullpen coach, filling big shoes for a team that relies on its relievers.

Austin Nola, who spent five years (2019-2023, 2025) as a big-league catcher with the Mariners, Padres, and Rockies, is going straight from backup Rockies backstop to the Mariners’ bullpen coach. The irony that the man who was traded for Andrés Muñoz will be his coach is duly noted, but as to the future, Nola will be tasked with keeping the producers producing and helping guys like Carlos Vargas, who struggled in 2025, reach their full potential with the team.

Seattle has had a lot of success developing relievers year after year, from elite talents like Muñoz to breakout 2025 pitchers like Eduard Bazardo and Gabe Speier. The year-to-year variations in reliever production mean that, perhaps more than any aspect of baseball, bullpen pitching is about nurture over nature. Nola, therefore, has some work cut out for him in 2026\. As a catcher, of course, Nola has plenty of experience manning a pitching staff, and with the rest of the arm coaching core still on the team, he will have something of a leg up for adjusting to his new role.

### Other Notes 

Incoming third base coach Carlos Cordoza and field coordinator Jake McKinley are both going into their first seasons in an MLB coaching role, with Cordoza coming from the minor leagues and McKinley from college ball. Cordoza is coming in to replace Kristopher Negron, now with the Pirates, while McKinley is filling in for Louis Boyd, who will be the assistant director of player development in 2026\. Bullpen catchers Fleming Báez and Justin Novak are returning to the team.