Red Sox Adding Shelley Duncan To Coaching Staff

The Red Sox are adding former big leaguer Shelley Duncan to their major league coaching staff, Chris Cotillo and Sean McAdam of MassLive.com report. As with Boston’s previously agreed-upon hiring of Jason Bell (who’d been with the Astros), a specific title has yet to be settled upon.

Duncan, 47, played in parts of seven big league seasons from 2007-13, totaling 330 games and 997 plate appearances as a first baseman and corner outfielder. He’s had a long coaching career in the more than decade that has passed since he called it quits as a player.

The Diamondbacks hired Duncan as a manager in the low levels of their system back in 2015. He spent a few seasons there before the Blue Jays hired him as their field coordinator ahead of the 2019 season. Duncan has also worked with the White Sox organization as their analytics coordinator and was most recently with the Yankees as the manager for their Triple-A affiliate in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, where he was named the 2025 International League Manager of the Year.

Boston cleaned house on its coaching staff back in April, firing then-manager Alex Cora and five members of his staff on the heels of a terrible start to the season. Their own Triple-A skipper, Chad Tracy, was elevated to the big league manager’s role on an interim basis. After the Red Sox embarked on a remarkable turnaround under Tracy and made the postseason, Tracy was signed to a three-year contract as the Red Sox’ new skipper, shedding the “interim” label.

The Sox have reassigned a pair of their interim coaches to new roles in the system. Chad Epperson, who’d been interim third base coach, is now managing at Triple-A in place of Tracy. Interim first base coach Pablo Cabrera is returning to his role as minor league field coordinator. Interim bench coach José David Flores, interim hitting coaches Collin Hetzler and Nelson Paulino, and interim hitting assistant Jack Simonetty are all still listed on Tracy’s staff with “interim” titles.