Terry Francona's most trusted advisor from Cleveland years officially retires

For six years, Brad Mills and Terry Francona were inseparable in the Cleveland Indians’ dugout. While Francona got plenty of attention at the top step of the home dugout at Progressive Field, Mills was always always by his side as Francona’s bench coach. 

Last season, Mills and Francona reunited some 250 miles away from Progressive Field in Cincinnati after Francona came out of retirement to manage the Reds. 

That ended up being a one year pairing, as Mills officially retired on Monday. 

Former Cleveland bench coach Brad Mils retires after final season with Terry Francona 

Mills’ journey with Francona started in college when they were teammates at the University of Arizona, and he ended up being on Francona’s staff at every one of his managerial stops. He served as the first base coach in Philadelphia before becoming his bench coach in Boston. He assumed the same role during Francona’s tenure in Cleveland. 

In between his stints in Boston and Cleveland, Mills was the manager of the Astros from 2010-’12 before being fired midway through his third season at the helm by general manager Jeff Luhnow after the front office slashed payroll. 

Mills served as Cleveland’s third base coach in Francona’s first year as manager before moving to bench coach until he left the organization. 

He stepped away from the team during the 2020 season and wasn’t involved in baseball until he was pulled back in by Francona ahead of the 2025 season. 

"This guy's like my older brother," Francona said last offseason. "I think I've learned more baseball from him than he's ever learned from me. I actually didn't think Millsy was a possibility just because I thought he was retired and I thought he was comfortable being retired."

That reunion coincided with the Reds pulling off the kind of season that should have looked familiar to every Guardians fan. After starting the season slow, Francona’s Reds caught fire as the season went on before pulling off a mad dash toward one of the National League’s Wild Card spots. They’d go on to lose to the Dodgers in the Wild Card Series. 

The Guardians' connections don’t stop there either, as Francona elected to promote former Cleveland slugger Mike Napoli to assistant bench coach after he had spent the 2025 season as a staff assistant. 

Napoli had previously played for Francona in Boston before coming to Cleveland in 2016, where he played a huge part in the Indians’ run to the World Series. Mills split his bench coach duties with Freddie Benavides, which is the same situation Napoli could himself in once the 2026 season gets here. Benavides served as the Red’s interim manager in 2024 after previous manager David Bell got fired.