HARWICH, Mass. — Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox manager Scott Pickler has become the Cape Cod Baseball League's first manager to achieve 600 career wins. Pickler, who has helmed Y-D since 1998, reached the milestone in the Red Sox’s 7-4 win over the Harwich Mariners on Aug. 1, 2024.
“I’ve coached 26 years…25 years… whatever it is, I don’t know, I don’t count them. I love coming to the yard, that’s all it is,” Pickler said after the milestone win over Harwich. “It's a longevity award, I've been here a long time. I got a lot of losses and I cherish my wins. It's been fun, it's been a blast.”
The next winningest manager in Cape League history is John Schiffner, who won 539 games over 25 years with the Chatham Anglers. In Pickler’s 26 years managing, the Red Sox have won six Cape League titles (‘04, ‘06, ‘07, ‘14, ‘15, ‘16) and led the East Division in regular season wins nine times (‘01, 04, ‘06, ‘07, ‘09, ‘10, ‘18, ‘23, ‘24).
Pickler has been named the Cape League Manager of the Year four times (‘07, ‘09, ‘10, ‘18) and was inducted into the Cape League Hall of Fame in 2019. The skipper has managed over 100 future Major League players in the Cape League, including Buster Posey, Chris Sale and Justin Turner.
Off the Cape, Pickler is most known for coaching at Cypress College (Calif.), a community college, for 35 years. There, Pickler has won more than 1,000 games and helped over 400 student-athletes receive scholarships at four-year schools. He was inducted into the California Community College Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame this year.
“I told them I’d do it for one year,” Pickler said of his start with Y-D. “Now, it’s been 26 years. It’s been a long time, a long time around a lot of really good players. It’s not me, it’s the players I’m able to recruit and the assistant coaches. The people of Yarmouth brought me back, accepted my wife and I, and it's been a great run.”
(Photograph by Danielle Stockwell)
