It has become a sort of rite of spring: A new season blooms in the desert — and Torey Lovullo is on the hot seat as the Diamondbacks’ manager.
Last season ended with speculation that Lovullo might not return for 2026, but he was told a day after the season that he would be back for the final year of his contract.
With spring training set to begin, Lovullo enters his 10th season on the job with his footing perhaps as wobbly as it's ever been. If his team does not perform, his job could be at stake.
Complicating matters for him is the fact that the area of the roster over which managers tend to be scrutinized most, the bullpen, is the same one that not just appears to be the weakest part of the team but also has been only modestly addressed during the offseason.
Add to that the Diamondbacks’ brutal schedule for the first month-plus of the season, and it's easy to envision Lovullo’s seat growing hot long before the triple-digit temperatures arrive in the Valley.
Not that this is unfamiliar territory for Lovullo. Starting in 2021, he entered three consecutive seasons with the lame-duck label.
Not that Lovullo is complaining. Quite the opposite.
“I can’t disagree with how they’ve handled things,” Lovullo said in a recent phone interview, referring to owner Ken Kendrick, team president Derrick Hall and general manager Mike Hazen. “We lost 110 games (in 2021), and I probably should have been fired and wasn’t.
Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo talks to reporters during a news conference at Major League Baseball's winter meetings, Dec. 9, 2025, in Orlando, Fla.
"We haven’t made the playoffs in two years and there was talk of me being dismissed, and I wasn’t. I kind of feel like I deserve to be in the position I’m in — and I have a lot to prove this year.”
Lovullo’s situation represents an interesting juxtaposition. Few managers survive after missing the playoffs in back-to-back years when expectations were sky high. Fewer remain employed after catastrophic seasons such as 2021. Lovullo is on his fourth pitching coach, fourth bench coach and third hitting coach.
All of which is to say Lovullo is right to be thankful he is still with the D-backs.
That said, the way he is viewed around the game leads many to believe that if he were to find himself unemployed, he wouldn’t have much trouble landing on his feet.
“No, he wouldn’t,” a top baseball executive with a rival team said. “While timing might matter, he’s extremely well-regarded and wouldn’t be out of work for long.”
Said another high-ranking official with another club: “He shouldn’t. He’s walked in lockstep with his boss. He’s a good person. Builds genuine relationships. Huge experience. If I was hiring and he was available, he would be on a very short list for me.”
Though he knew his future was uncertain late last season, Lovullo said he was able to compartmentalize those thoughts and focus on the season — and on the D-backs’ surprising wild-card push after they sold at the deadline. He said he plans to handle any external pressure this year in the same way.
“If I worry about the things I can’t control, worry about the pressures that are externally on me, I’m wasting my time and I’m not going to be present for the players,” he said. “That’s all I care about is being present for the players and doing right by everybody that’s inside of that building every single day.”
While Lovullo still has what seems like unwavering support from Hazen and the club’s baseball operations department, he seems to be graded more harshly by ownership, though Kendrick, the club’s managing general partner, praised him in a radio interview last September for the way the team played in the second half.
Lovullo is hoping to use that momentum from the club’s strong finish to get off to a fast start this year. They were better, he said, because they played a cleaner brand of baseball.
“We’ve got to be fundamentally sound coming out of spring training,” Lovullo said. “We’re already kind of pushing that forward. We have a lot to build on, but nothing is going to be automatic, and I want to pick up where we left off last year.”
Arizona Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo, left, takes the ball from Diamondbacks pitcher Taylor Rashi, right, as Diamondbacks catcher Gabriel Moreno looks on during the seventh inning against the Philadelphia Phillies, Sept. 19, 2025, in Phoenix.
The D-backs’ schedule will make that difficult. Of their first 11 series, seven come against clubs that reached the postseason last year. Of the other four, three are against teams that could very well contend this season: the Braves, Mets and Orioles.
As for the pressures that might create, Lovullo said he can’t worry about it.
“Control the controllable things; that’s been my conclusion,” he said. “I don’t feel any more or less urgency. Every year for me is a new challenge. And I get a report card at the end of the year, as I should.”
