New Britain native Roberto Mercado goes from coaching high school to managing in the pros
Sometimes baseball players are drafted out of high school ... but managers?
It’s unusual, but Roberto Mercado is making that jump. After 10 years as coach at New Britain High, Mercado was hired this week to lead the Aberdeen IronBirds, High Class A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles.
“I’ve kind of been preparing for this my entire life without even realizing it,” said Mercado, 42, born and raised in New Britain and a graduate of its high school. “I’ve always been lifelong learner. I’m a sponge and all those experiences have prepared me. When I got a call from the Baltimore Orioles I was like, ‘what the heck’s going on here?’ But I was super excited about it.”
At New Britain High, where he was also dean of students, Mercado led the Hurricanes to four conference or division titles, posting a 139-80 records across 10 years.
“The Orioles made a great hire,” UConn coach Jim Penders said. “He’s a great baseball guy, but an even greater guy because he cares so deeply about his players and is a teacher first.”
Mercado already considers himself a “baseball lifer. He has been spending his summers since 2014 coaching on the Cape Cod League, where he worked with several future major leaguers with the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox, and made an impression on college coaches and professional player-development people. He has embraced coaching opportunities wherever he could find them, as far as Australia and New Zealand in the Goodwill Series.
“Once we had an opening, I called around to people I trust,” said Matt Blood, the Orioles’ director of player development. “And his name was given to me, so I did a little more research. His background, the work he’s done on The Cape, the work’s done in New Britain, not only as a coach but as a leader of students. There were a lot of things lined up, and once we met him we were really impressed with his professionalism, his humility and his genuine desire to do things well. All those things together got us excited about him.”
After his graduation from New Britain High, Mercado played at UConn-Avery Point and Division III Fitchburg State.
In his role as dean of students, Mercado has dealt with a wide variety of situations, including some tense times when students returned to New Britain High for in-person learning last September. As a minor league manager, where he will be commanding clubhouses with young players from all over the world, his experience in problem-solving could be valuable.
“From getting to know parents and getting to know students from different backgrounds, dealing with teachers and different personalities,” Mercado said, “as well as mediations and things you do. All my experiences in my life and my jobs have helped prepare me for this.”
Mercado said his parents instilled in him “a work ethic to work hard, never give up and have passion for everything you do.” Other important influences are Ron Jakubowski, former superintendent of schools in New Britain, and Scott Pickler, the head coach at Yarmouth-Dennis.
“We’ve hired a lot of teachers,” Blood said. “We look for people who can teach to be coaches. Our major league hitting coach (Ryan Fuller), he’s also from Connecticut (Old Lyme and UConn), and we hired him two years ago and he was a high school teacher. We look for people who are driven to be educators, who know how to teach.”
Mercado is in Sarasota, Fla., working at the Orioles instructional camp, getting to know the prospects whose development will be in his hands.
“Success for me is building those relationships with the players,” he said. “And having them trust me feel confident that I am putting them in the best situations to be successful. That’s the main role in the minor league so they continue to move on. It’s not necessarily about our record at the end of the season, it’s about guys getting better.”
The Aberdeen, Md., franchise, owned by Hall-of-Famer Cal Ripken, played for many years in the short-season NY-Penn League. When that level and league was eliminated in minor league baseball’s reorganization, Aberdeen moved into High-A Northeast in 2021. The league has teams in Brooklyn and Fishkill, N.Y., the closest Mercado, who recently married his wife, Samantha, will get to Connecticut next summer.
The Orioles moved Kyle Moore was up to manage Double A Bowie, creating the opening at Aberdeen. Forrest Herrmann will be Mercado’s pitching coach, Zach Cole his hitting coach.
“Success for Roberto is going to be to learn the organization’s philosophy,” Blood said, “and create a strong culture there with his coaching staff and with the players and just create the learning environment where the players are getting better.”
Dom Amore can be reached at damore@courant.com
