HARTFORD, Conn. — After leading the Hartford Yard Goats to their best season in franchise history, skipper Bobby Meacham has been named the Eastern League Manager of the Year by Minor League Baseball.
This season, the Yard Goats, the Double-A Eastern League affiliate of Major League Baseball’s Colorado Rockies, earned the first half Northeast Division Championship and their first-ever playoff appearance.
By going 38-30 in the first half of the season, the Yard Goats clinched the division title. They duplicated their success during the season’s second half, going 38-30 again to finish the season 76-60.
According to the Yard Goats, seven players from this year’s Hartford team reached the Major Leagues, the most in franchise history. The Yard Goats also led the league with 207 stolen bases, ranked third in batting and hits and were the toughest team to strike out.
Meacham has proven to be an effective mentor who has leaned on his own big-league career, after playing six seasons with the Yankees from 1983-1988, mostly as a shortstop.
“We are excited to hear that Bobby has been named Eastern League manager of the Year,” Yard Goats General Manager Mike Abramson said. “He is well deserving of this award for all of his accomplishments on the field, and for leading the Yard Goats to the playoffs. It was fun to watch his aggressive style of coaching and his hard work in developing the next generation of Rockies players.”
The Yard Goats said that Meacham just finished his 34th year as a coach in MLB-affiliated baseball. In January, he was named the fifth manager in Yard Goats history after spending the 2023 season as the bench coach for the Rockies AAA affiliate, the Albuquerque Isotopes in the Pacific Coast League.
Previously, Meacham served as an assistant for the Philadelphia Phillies under manager Joe Girardi from January 2020 through June 2022. He also spent time on Major League coaching staffs with Florida Marlins, San Diego Padres, New York Yankees and Houston Astros from 2006-2012.
Meacham, a Los Angeles native, spent the 2013-2019 seasons managing at three levels in the Toronto Blue Jays Minor League system, including three in the Eastern League for the New Hampshire Fisher Cats from 2014-2016.
Meacham has managed at every level of the minor leagues – A, AA, AAA, according to the Yard Goats. In 2008, he was the third base coach for the New York Yankees.
The Yard Goats open the 2025 season on Friday, April 4 at Dunkin’ Park against the rival Somerset Patriots, the New York Yankees’ affiliate who eliminated Hartford from the postseason last week.
Season tickets are available here. Individual tickets and promotions will be announced later.
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Dalton Zbierski is a digital content producer and writer at FOX61 News. He can be reached at dzbierski@FOX61.com.
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