Yankees experience proved invaluable to Astros manager Joe Espada

HOUSTON — Joe Espada is blunt.

He wouldn't be the manager of the Houston Astros — his first managerial job after several years of frustration while interviewing for myriad openings across the sport and seeing someone else viewed by management as the “right” guy — without the time he spent with the Yankees.

“Invaluable,” Espada told Newsday on Friday before the second game of his Astros' four-game series against the Yankees. “One hundred percent. That was a chapter in my career that I needed to become the manager I am today, or get to be the manager I am today.”

Espada, 48, was not with the Yankees for long.

He came to the organization in 2014 from the Marlins, where he had been their third-base coach from 2010-13. After working in the Yankees' pro scouting department in 2014, Espada moved back to the field and was Joe Girardi’s bench coach from 2015-17.

After Girardi was let go following the 2017 season, one  that ended in an ALCS Game 7 loss to Houston, Espada joined the Astros as AJ Hinch’s bench coach in 2018. After Hinch was fired in January 2020 following MLB’s investigation into the Astros' illegal sign-stealing, Espada stayed on as Dusty Baker’s bench coach, serving in that capacity until the latter’s retirement at the end of last season.

Still, all of that time, Espada carried with him what he learned with the Yankees.

“For me, from the get-go, I was exposed to technology and the new ways of thinking in baseball. I was exposed to a lot of information in New York, and the level of collaboration there was something that was fascinating,” Espada said. “I was in the office [as a pro scout in 2014] with some really smart people, and your voice was heard.”

That was contrary to some preconceived notions he had at the start. But early on, sitting in meetings run by general manager Brian Cashman put him at ease.

“I thought, going to New York, there was going to be this nucleus of people there and they have all the answers,” Espada said. “But no, they actually wanted to hear from everyone — from the scouting side, coaches. I thought that was really good. It helped me. You’re a Yankee, you sit in that room, it could be an intimidating room. But the way Brian treated me and treated the people around him, it makes you kind of relax and be comfortable.”

But Espada, a coach at heart, soon was back on the field and thrust into a clubhouse that was in Year 1 without Derek Jeter, who had retired after the 2014 season, but still had established veterans such as Alex Rodriguez, Mark Teixeira, Brett Gardner, Brian McCann, Chase Headley and Carlos Beltran.

“Being around players who have done it, figuring out a way to communicate and coach a player who’s been in the league for many, many years,” Espada said. “I was in Miami working with younger players, now all of a sudden I’m talking to A-Rod . . . had Chase Headley, who was a veteran just signed as a free agent. I’m coaching third base and I’ve got Brett Gardner. That clubhouse I went from [a young one in Miami] and now I’ve got to coach these guys and push them to do things and to be able to communicate with those guys. It took a lot of early hours during spring training for me to get to know a lot of those guys.”

And, of course, Espada brought with him to Houston the expectation of winning.

Though the Yankees were a team in transition during his tenure with them — they missed the playoffs in 2014 and ’16, were bounced from the wild-card game in ’15 and suffered the tough ALCS loss in ’17 — that didn’t mean the yearly expectations ever changed.

Carlos Mendoza, who worked in the Yankees' organization for 15 years before taking over as the Mets' manager before this season, has said multiple times since taking that job: “It’s New York. The expectations are always high — you need to win.”

Espada, who remains in touch with Cashman — and with some others in the organization — absorbed the same.

“Every game matters. Every game meant something. You’re under the microscope 24/7. Every decision you make, it matters,” Espada said. “You learn how to stay calm in a very stressful environment. That’s what New York does. I’m so happy I went to New York.”