Tyler Zombro. Photo: Twitter
Harrisonburg native and R.E. Lee (now Staunton) High School alum Tyler Zombro has been promoted by the Chicago Cubs to the position of vice president of pitching.
Zombro, 31, made it to the Triple-A level with the Tampa Bay Rays and Texas Rangers organizations before retiring in 2024, and joining the Cubs front office in the 2024-2025 offseason as a special assistant to the franchise’s president of baseball operations, Jed Hoyer.
His focus in his first year was at the Major League level. Per reporting from The Athletic, Zombro was credited for the development of Brad Keller, who signed a minor-league deal last winter and developed into an elite reliever for the Cubbies – going 4-2 with a 2.07 ERA, 0.92 WHIP, 2.93 FIP and 1.4 WAR in 68 appearances in 2025.
Zombro, also an alum of George Mason, where he was 23-17 with a 3.28 ERA in four seasons, was being pursued by the Washington Nationals organization to be the pitching coach under first-year manager Blake Butera, a former Rays minor-leaguer, minor-league manager and front-office guy.
The tie there: Zombro signed with the Rays as an undrafted free agent out of George Mason in 2017, and rose quickly through the ranks, getting to Triple-A in 2019, though he was never able to get past the Triple-A level.
That was in part due to the terrifying injury that he suffered while pitching with Triple-A Durham against the Norfolk Tides in 2021. Zombro was hit in the head by a 104-mph line drive off the bat of Brett Cumberland that fractured his skull and caused him to have a seizure on the mound.
Defying the odds, Zombro was able to return to baseball for spring training in 2022, but he was only able to get into four more games over the next two seasons before deciding to retire.
A successful first year in the Cubs front office got the attention of the Nats, but the Cubs declined to allow the organization to interview Zombro, per reports, giving him the promotion to a post that gives him an expanded role in scouting, coaching and player development at the big-league and minor-league levels.