Toronto Blue Jays skipper John Schneider will manage the 2026 American League All-Star Team, an honor that always goes to the manager of the reigning AL champions. Schneider will bring his Blue Jays staff to the highly anticipated event. All-Star managers also get to choose one manager from another team to join their staff for the game, and Schneider chose Twins skipper Derek Shelton.
It's not the first time Shelton has been added to an All-Star team's coaching staff. In 2023, Philadelphia Phillies skipper Rob Thompson chose Shelton, the Pittsburgh Pirates' manager at the time, as the additional manager to join the National League's coaching staff for the All-Star Game.
Schneider called Shelton during spring training to let him know he wanted him to join the AL All-Star Team staff, according to The Minnesota Star Tribune's Bobby Nightengale. The two managers worked together with the Blue Jays organization in 2017 when Schneider was the manager of high-Class A Dunedin and Shelton was a quality control coach. Nightengale wrote that Shelton wanted Schneider to join his coaching staff with the Pirates, but Schneider had already been promoted to Toronto's coaching staff. Schneider also told Shelton during last year's playoffs he was interested in hiring him for his coaching staff with the Blue Jays if the former Pirates skipper couldn't find a manager job.
Twins' Derek Shelton has a lot of respect in MLB
The fact that Shelton has been invited to join an All-Star Game coaching staff twice shows that the Twins manager has a lot of respect among MLB managers and coaches. Even though the Pirates fired Shelton last May after a horrific start to the season, most people know Shelton wasn't the reason for Pittsburgh's rough stretch during his time as the team's manager (2020-2025). The Pirates are off to a hot start this year with a 9-6 record, largely due to notable offseason additions Ryan O'Hearn and Brandon Lowe. When Shelton was in charge of the team, he didn't have a good enough roster to lead the team to the playoffs. And even with the Pirates' strong start, the team will likely regress eventually.
Shelton is doing a great job managing the Twins thus far, as Minnesota leads the American League with a 9-7 record. It's unknown exactly how much he's influenced the players during the Twins' hot start, but he deserves credit for being in charge of a team that has surpassed expectations early in 2026.
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