Asheville Tourists announce new coaching staff

Posted on — Jeff Fobes

The Colorado Rockies announces:

Former Tourists infielder Warren Schaeffer will manage the Asheville Tourists for the 2015 campaign. Schaeffer will be joined in the Tourists’ dugout by Development Supervisor Marv Foley; Hitting Coach Mike Devereaux; and Pitching Coach Mark Brewer. Also new to the staff is Athletic Trainer Casey Papas, who served in the same role with Short Season-A Tri-City in 2014.

Schaeffer has spent the past two seasons as a hitting coach in the Rockies’ organization; both with the Tri-City Dust Devils. Prior to coaching, Schaeffer played in the Rockies minor league system from 2007-2012, including a 92-game stint with the Tourists in 2008. The Vandergrift, PA native was originally drafted by the Rockies in the 38th round of the 2007 MLB draft out of Virginia Tech University. He follows in the footsteps of former Tourists skipper Fred Ocasio who was promoted to High-A Modesto this season.

“I cannot thank Freddie (Ocasio) enough for everything he brought to this organization and our fans over the past two seasons. We all wish him the best moving forward,” said Tourists president Brian DeWine. “However, I am delighted to welcome Warren, his wife Callie, and their infant son Beauman to the Asheville community.”

Foley will work hand-in-hand with the coaching staff as the Development Supervisor; a leadership role that is highly responsible for the oversight and implementation of the Colorado Rockies development philosophies and practices. Foley served as Asheville’s Development Supervisor in 2013 and 2014.

The 2015 campaign will be Devereaux’s fourth slate with the Tourists and fifth in the Rockies’ organization after spending the previous two seasons in the Baltimore Orioles’ farm system. Devereaux played 12 seasons in the major leagues. He finished seventh in the Most Valuable Player balloting in 1992 for the Orioles. He also was named the MVP of the 1995 National League Championship Series. Last summer, the Casper, WY native was inducted into the National High School Hall of Fame.

Brewer has over 20 years of professional experience as a pitching coach in major league organizations, and enters his second season in that capacity with Asheville. Overall, Brewer has been a pitching coach in the player development systems for the Dodgers, Rangers, Royals, Pirates, Mets, and Rockies. Brewer also has over 10 years of experience as a pitching coach in the Latin America Winter Leagues.

The defending South Atlantic League Champion Tourists open the 2015 season at McCormick Field on April 16 against the Greenville Drive at 7:05pm. Season ticket packages are currently available at the McCormick Field ServPro Box Office. For more information, contact the Tourists’ front office at (828) 258-0428.

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About Jeff Fobes
As a long-time proponent of media for social change, my early activities included coordinating the creation of a small community FM radio station to serve a poor section of St. Louis, Mo. In the 1980s I served as the editor of the "futurist" newsletter of the U.S. Association for the Club of Rome, a professional/academic group with a global focus and a mandate to act locally. During that time, I was impressed by a journalism experiment in Mississippi, in which a newspaper reporter spent a year in a small town covering how global activities impacted local events (e.g., literacy programs in Asia drove up the price of pulpwood; soybean demand in China impacted local soybean prices). Taking a cue from the Mississippi journalism experiment, I offered to help the local Green Party in western North Carolina start its own newspaper, which published under the name Green Line. Eventually the local party turned Green Line over to me, giving Asheville-area readers an independent, locally focused news source that was driven by global concerns. Over the years the monthly grew, until it morphed into the weekly Mountain Xpress in 1994. I've been its publisher since the beginning. Mountain Xpress' mission is to promote grassroots democracy (of any political persuasion) by serving the area's most active, thoughtful readers. Consider Xpress as an experiment to see if such a media operation can promote a healthy, democratic and wise community. In addition to print, today's rapidly evolving Web technosphere offers a grand opportunity to see how an interactive global information network impacts a local community when the network includes a locally focused media outlet whose aim is promote thoughtful citizen activism. Follow me @fobes
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