After multiple teams posted lackluster seasons or outright collapsed before the playoffs in 2025, the season experienced a managerial firing spree. One of the casualties was Brandon Hyde, former skipper of the Boston Red Sox's American League East rival, the Baltimore Orioles.
The rush for clubs to sign new managers has already started, and the O's have found their guy. Baltimore on October 27 formally announced its hiring of Craig Albernaz, a former minor league baseball player in the Rays organization and MLB coach since 2015. The 43-year-old has served as a minor league manager at multiple levels in the Rays organization, a bullpen and catching coach for the Giants, and bench coach and associate manager for the Guardians.
Albernaz was born in Fall River, MA and grew up just up the road in Somerset. Baltimore introduced its new manager with a video message posted to Twitter and his Massachusetts connection is... quite obvious.
His Boston accented pronunciations of "Camden Yahds" and "this yeah" have garnered a lot of attention from fans in the comments. Some love his accent and others have accused Albernaz of being a Red Sox sleeper agent (if he is, his hometown surely wouldn't complain).
Don’t get me wrong I love a good Boston accent but I’ll always be nervous he’s a double agent that’ll throw a game to help his precious Sox get another pennant. He’ll be on their 100th documentary like “they were the better team” with a smirk on his face
— Charlie Burr (@ShowMeUrOsFace) October 30, 2025
Red Sox fans will love the Orioles' new manager's strong Boston accent in his introduction video
The Orioles fired Hyde on May 17 after they started the season with a 15–28 record. For multiple seasons running in the early 2020s, Baltimore's farm system was heralded as one of the strongest in baseball. The Birds' young players quickly made an impact, and they finished in first place in the AL East with 101 wins in 2023 and landed in second place in 2024. They never lasted long in the postseason, though, with an ALDS exit in 2023 and a Wild Card elimination the next year.
I truly hope this is a home run hire for my Birds, but I just can't with that accent. We have translators for foreign players, can we get a dialect coach for the skipper? Otherwise, I'll be reading transcripts of pressers instead of listening, that's for damn sure.
— JDH (@jdh_ki) October 29, 2025
The underwhelming start in the throes of their contending window was the nail in Hyde's coffin as skipper. He had no major league managing experience when the O's hired him in 2018. Albernaz also doesn't have any big league management experience, which makes him seem like a questionable choice for a team with the contention clock ticking. But Jon Meoli of The Baltimore Banner thinks the Orioles made the right choice for their squad.
"That’s clear by the type of manager they hired in Albernaz, whose stops over the years tell us what the Orioles think about themselves and where this project can take them," he wrote. "...Put it all together and you have a manager who has largely been a popular and energetic figure on the clubs he’s coached and comes from organizations where collaboration is a culture, not just a buzzword."
Baltimore is hopeful it found the guy to rally its young players and help them work their way to a World Series or two, and picking someone as fun to listen to as Albernaz could pay off. Meanwhile, the Red Sox and their fans will hope his hometown loyalties prevail as their contending window just begins to open.