It’s so good to have successful leadership back in the Rangers dugout. 

Managers who know how to manage because they’ve done it before.

Coaches who know how to coach and have had success doing it.

Jon Daniels liked to hire managers who had never managed before. Yes, he had some success doing that. Ron Washington had never managed a game at any level. He took the Rangers to two World Series. He lost to Bruce Bochy and to Tony La Russa. At least Jeff Banister had minor league managing experience. He won a Manager of the Year award his first year, took the team to the playoffs his first two year, then two years later was fired. Chris Woodward was in way over his head.

The process. It’s the process. They need to learn the process. That was the constant refrain of failure that Chris Woodward repeated on seemingly a daily basis. There was a process and the players were learning it. Just wait until the process kicks in.

Cut to this year. 

There is no process. There is no mantra. There is only winning. Bruce Bochy and Mike Maddux. Guys who have had success in the past. Tim Hyers is the hitting coach. The Rangers are the best offensive team in baseball. Hyers was here last year and the years before that. But he was bogged down in the process.

Jon Gray and Nathan Eovaldi are Ezequiel Duran are having career years so far. They all credit the coaching and managing.

Leadership matters.

The Astros brough in Dusty Baker. The Mets hired Buck Showalter. The White Sox brought in Tony LaRussa—that one didn’t work out but the thinking was sound. You need someone in the dugout who knows how to manage a game, knows how to win, trusts gut reactions and the eyeball test and doesn’t need to have the nerds from the analytics department telling him how to run a game.

That’s why the Rangers are winning. They have leadership that knows how to get the most out of players. And win.

Experience matters. Simple concept. Hard for some general managers to understand.

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