KANSAS CITY -- Thursday was an instrumental day for the Royals, as Matt Quatraro was formally introduced as the Royals’ 18th manager in franchise history in a news conference at Kauffman Stadium.

He met with media in small groups, walked through the Royals' clubhouse and went out to the field to take pictures -- between corralling his two young sons, George and Leo, as they ran around the outfield grass and onto the pitching mound.

The morning ended with a reception for the Quatraro family with Royals employees -- and then it was time to get to work.

“It’s surreal still,” Quatraro said. “The process is such a whirlwind. Your mind is everywhere. Now that it’s here, it’s like, ‘OK, my feet are on the ground, we’re talking about this, it’s real.’ But there’s so much work ahead and the process we’re going to dive into.”

While Quatraro gets to know his new home, organization and roster, he and the Royals are getting to work on filling out his coaching staff. There are several positions to fill.

Bench coach Pedro Grifol concluded a 10-year run with the Royals on Thursday when he was named the White Sox manager, an opportunity several in the Kansas City organization were glad to see for Grifol, who gets his first chance to manage in the Majors after more than 23 years in baseball as a scout, farm director, coach and Minor League manager.

Grifol was a candidate for several managerial positions in recent years, including twice with the Royals. It was clear that the American League Central-rival White Sox were enamored with Grifol, while Kansas City was looking for an outside hire to bring in fresh ideas and a new voice.

“Really happy for him,” executive vice president and general manager J.J. Picollo said. “I had a great discussion with Pedro on Sunday morning when we told him we were going a different direction. But also had a pretty good indication that he was still in the running with the White Sox in a good spot. Pedro’s a pro. He handled it excellent. Pedro believes that if it was going to happen, it would happen. Luckily, 24 hours later, he was in a good spot.”

Picollo then quipped: “Now we’ve just got to beat him.”

Picollo said he expects the White Sox to request to speak with members of the Royals’ coaching staff about joining Grifol’s staff in Chicago, but no such discussions had taken place as of Thursday morning. Reports in Chicago indicated assistant hitting coach Mike Tosar, who is close with Grifol, could be a candidate to join the White Sox staff.

And the Royals might approach the Rays about hiring members of their staff to join Quatraro in Kansas City. As of Thursday, the only coaching positions filled are hitting coordinator Alec Zumwalt, assistant hitting coach Keoni DeRenne and Tosar -- although that could change -- as well as first-base and outfield coach Damon Hollins.

“If you can get one staff member to come with you, in this case, it would be very helpful for both Pedro and Matt to have somebody they’re familiar with,” Picollo said. “That’s something we’ll work out.”

Roles still up in the air include bullpen coach Larry Carter, Major League coach John Mabry and third-base coach Vance Wilson (who also interviewed for the manager position). Kansas City might also want to promote Triple-A manager Scott Thorman to the big league staff, given that he interviewed for the managerial opening and is close with several of the Royals’ young players.

Quatraro will work with Picollo and his staff to hire a pitching coach, which is the most important coaching hire Kansas City will make this offseason, given how young its staff is and how disappointing the results were in 2022.

Many of the qualities the Royals saw in Quatraro -- attentive, steady, communicative and collaborative, as well as a willingness to understand and utilize data -- will be what they look for in a pitching coach.

“There’s a tremendous amount of talent on the pitching staff right now,” Quatraro said. “I’ve talked to a handful of the guys already, and they are super anxious and eager to reach their potential. … What I’m looking for from now forward is maximizing their potential through some tweaks in approach or maybe pitch usage and those kinds of things. The talent is clearly there.”

Quatraro will be looking for coaching candidates who are “curious,” and “open-minded,” as well as those who can communicate and collaborate well.

He was clear Thursday that he doesn’t want to micromanage any of his coaches.

“We’ll be talking about things, but the pitching coach and the bullpen coach, they’re the managers of that area,” Quatraro said. “The hitting guys, the same in their area. The more plugged in they are to those players, the more back and forth there is in that area. And then the more growth we get, the faster we see the improvements.”