Arizona Hires Chip Hale as Head Coach

Arizona on Monday announced that Chip Hale will be its next head coach, replacing Jay Johnson, who departed earlier this summer for Louisiana State. 

Hale, an Arizona baseball alum who tops the program record book in career games played, hits and total bases, will work under a five-year contract with the school. 

Although he has no experience in college coaching, Hale has extensive experience coaching in the professional ranks. Most recently, he was the third base coach for the Tigers, but he also served on coaching staffs with the Nationals (where he won a World Series in 2019), Athletics, D-Backs and Mets, and he circled back to the D-Backs as manager for two seasons in 2015-16. 

After his playing career in Tucson (1984-87), during which he won a national title in 1986 and was the Pac-10’s player of the year in 1987, Hale embarked on a lengthy professional career that culminated in seven seasons spent in the big leagues, six with the Twins. 

Hale’s hiring combines two recent trends in college coaching hires—hiring famous alums of the program and hiring coaches with extensive backgrounds coaching in pro ball who may or may not have any real experience coaching high-level college baseball. 

Just this offseason, Arizona State hired famous alum Willie Bloomquist and Rice hired Jose Cruz, Jr., a famous alum who also happened to be a colleague of Hale’s on the Tigers staff. 

The best comparison for this hire, however, might be Wichita State’s hiring of Eric Wedge in 2019. Not only is Wedge an alum of Wichita State who came to the job after years of working in pro baseball, but like Hale, he’s a relative college coaching rarity in that he was a big league manager. 

For Arizona, this hire is also unique in that it brings in someone from within the Arizona family. Johnson and Andy Lopez before him both had successful stints leading the program, but neither had played for or coached Arizona before taking over. 

Even as freshman phenom Jacob Berry transferred to play for Johnson at LSU and several Arizona players project to be drafted later this month, Hale should have a talented roster on his hands right away in 2022, led by catcher Daniel Susac and a pitching staff potentially headlined by T.J. Nichols. 

The Wildcats are surpassed by few in terms of historical greatness, with 18 College World Series appearances and four national titles to their name. Hale’s challenge will be to keep Arizona contending for Pac-12 titles and trips to Omaha into the future.