Royals’ Matt Quatraro showed makings of a manager during his playing days in minors

Longtime baseball executive Cam Bonifay didn’t have a crystal ball, nor did he claim any supernatural clairvoyance for his role in starting a minor-league catcher named Matt Quatraro on the road to becoming the manager of the Kansas City Royals.

Bonifay and former Tampa Bay Rays minor-league field coordinator Jim Hoff started off Quatraro’s coaching career in the Rays’ farm system in 2004.

Now this spring, Quatraro, 49, begins his residency in the manager’s office in the home clubhouse at Kauffman Stadium.

“You never know the inside makings of an individual,” Bonifay told The Star. “But just from the outside effects of the way he went about his job and the way he prepared to do his job every day as a player, you knew that the internal aspiration of being a manager was there.”

Bonifay, now an assistant to the general manager for the Cincinnati Reds, has spent 45 years in professional baseball as a player, baseball operations staffer, scout and executive.

He served as general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1993-2001 before he joined the Rays as head of player development and scouting, where he oversaw the end of Quatraro’s playing career.

The characteristics Bonifay recognized — the inquisitive nature, ability to communicate and being a good teammate — made him a strong candidate to join the player development department.

“With his background, his ability, his work ethic, his understanding of the game, the ability to communicate with the players around him and an inquisitive mind as a player, we just felt like they were all good qualities that he possessed,” Bonifay said. “If he started down the road, then (there’s) no telling where it might lead.”

The thing that stood out the most? His ability to connect with people.

“I just think that’s the key with any managerial position, whether it be a manager in baseball or a leader in corporate America,” Bonifay said. “I mean, you have to have that ability to lead. I thought the traits of being a good teammate — the helping, the encouraging, also leading, performing when times were tough and when times were easy — I think all those you have to be able to do to be an outstanding leader of people and of men, especially in this game of baseball.

“There’s a lot of things about this game and the intricacies of the game. It’s not just between the lines, but the clubhouse, how you get a band of people to follow you. You’ve got to be able to do that. I think he has that attribute to be successful doing that.”

Quatraro gave his big-league dreams one last chance in spring training with the New York Yankees in 2003, but then he transitioned from player to coach. He became the first former player in the Rays system to join the organization as a coach, first as a catching instructor in the minors in 2004.

The new Royals manager finished that season as a hitting coach for the Rays’ short-season Single-A affiliate. He then managed four years in the Rays’ farm system from 2006-09, followed by four years as their minor-league hitting coordinator.

The Cleveland Indians (now Guardians) hired Quatraro in 2014 as their assistant hitting coach in the majors.

“He was the second hitting guy,” said Guardians manager Terry Francona, a two-time World Series champion and three-time AL Manager of the Year. “So you’re kind of in a — what’s the word — subservient, when you’re second; you’re not really leading.

“We didn’t really get to his ideas, it was more like (hitting coach) Ty Van Burkleo’s ideas and Q was there to support. But we had heard so many good things about him we wanted to get him in the organization. And when you get good guys, you know they’re going to get better jobs and leave. And that’s what happened.”

Quatraro remained on Francona’s staff until 2017, when he returned to the Rays alongside manager Kevin Cash, another former coach under Francona in Cleveland.

“Everybody thought so highly of him,” Cash said of Quatraro. “He went to Cleveland for good reason, got an opportunity. When something opened up for our group, everybody kind of slammed the table like let’s get him back here because he’s a Ray, and he was very special to a lot of players’ development.”

During his five-year tenure on Cash’s staff in Tampa Bay, the Rays won 90 games or more three times and 100 games once in four full-length seasons.

The Rays also won the AL pennant and appeared in the World Series during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season with Quatraro as the bench coach.

“And the impact that he had on the staff throughout the entire organization,” Cash continued, “was just great.”