After leaving Detroit, the Tigers’ former first base coach lands with a team everyone expected and knows well.yv

In late October, the Tigers dismissed first base coach Anthony Iapoce, the first to go in a wave of firings and hirings this offseason. Hitting coach Keith Beauregard and coach Gary Jones followed a few days later.

The Orioles’ Anthony Sanders will replace Iapoce at first base in 2026, and Detroit also poached hitting coach Cody Asche from Baltimore to hire him as an assistant hitting coach. Cubs front office member Alex Smith became the Tigers’ new vice president of baseball strategy (whatever that means), and minor league infield coordinator Billy Boyer was promoted to major league quality coach.

On Wednesday, Chandler Rome of The Athletic reported that Iapoce is headed to a familiar foe and AJ Hinch’s former squad, the Astros, as an assistant hitting coach. Before transitioning into the role of first base coach with the Tigers, Iapoce was the Red Sox’s senior hitting coordinator in 2022 and a hitting coach with the Rangers and Cubs from 2016-2018 and 2019-2021, respectively.

Former Tigers first base coach Anthony Iapoce hired by Astros as an assistant hitting coach

The typically inevitable Astros were spectacularly average in 2025, even though they maintained their lead in the AL West from June through mid-September before the Mariners finally toppled them at the end of the season. They finished with a record identical to the Tigers’, but Detroit held the tiebreaker, which kept Houston out of the playoffs for the first time in nine seasons.

The 2025 Astros offense was 12th in team batting average, 15th in OPS, 16th in homers, and 21st in runs scored. Again, spectacularly average. The last time Iapoce worked in a strictly hitting-related capacity for a team, the 2022 Red Sox finished third in batting average and ninth in OPS, so maybe Iapoce will be able to help the Astros get back on track in 2026.

The Tigers have gotten the better of the Astros two years in a row now — first when they swept them out of the postseason in the 2024 Wild Card and this year by keeping them out of the postseason altogether. If picking up a former Tigers coach makes them feel better about themselves, then by all means.