Tony DeFrancesco: 2020 Mets First Base Coach

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Anthony John DeFrancesco was born April 24th 1963 in Suffern, New York. The Italian American Rockland, County native, attended Seton Hall University & was a ninth round pick of the Boston Red Sox in 1984.

  DeFrancesco would play minor league ball for the  Red Sox & Cincinnati Reds from 1984 - 1992. He was a lifetime .232 hitter with 17 HRs & 167 RBIs in 567 career minor league games. Primarily a catcher who played briefly in the outfield, at third & first base.

He retired from playing in 1992 & by 1994 was a minor league manager, winning the Sporting News Minor League Manager of the Year Award in 2003 with the Sacramento River Cats, in the Pacific Coast League.

DeFrancesco spent one season as the Oakland A's third base coach (2008) before returning to Sacramento.

In  2012 he got his only shot at MLB managerial experience, he headed the Houston Astros for 41 games replacing Brad Mills. His first win came against the New York Mets on April 24th. His record as manager was 16-25 overall that season.

Trivia: He became the last manager of the Astros in the National League as the team transferred to the American League in 2013.

He returned to the minors, managing & leading the AAA Fresno Grizzlies to a championship, winning another Manager of the Year Award. In 2018 he replaced Wally Backman to manage the Mets AAA, Las Vegas 51's club, finishing in third place with a 71-69 record.

Overall he has been won four Pacific Coast League Championships & two AAA National Championships in his 21 years of managing.

 In the 2019 Syracuse Chiefs season, the talented roster made up 6 1/2 games from August 7th to August 26th to qualify for a one game playoff against Scranton Wilkes/Barre. Syracuse blew a seven run lead in the 8th inning taking the loss & not making the playoffs.
DeFranceso interviewed for the Mets managers job in the 0ff season but the job went to Carlos Beltran. After the Astros sign stealing scandal,  in which he was part of became an issue, Beltran resigned but the job went to Luis Rojas.

 DeFranceso will be the Mets first base coach in 2020.

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