ARLINGTON, Texas – The Texas Rangers added some championship pedigree to their front office Thursday by hiring Michael Young as a special assistant to general manager Jon Daniels.
Young, who is just a year removed from a stellar playing career, will help the club in all facets of baseball operations from player evaluation and development to special assignments to scouting trips.
Young, who spent 12 years with the Rangers and is the club's all-time hits leader, thought he would need more time away from the game following his playing career. But one season away was all it took for him to know that he wanted to be involved in the game once again and the Rangers were the natural choice.
"This is something we kicked around since the day I retired," said Young, who spent the 2013 season with Philadelphia and Los Angeles after being traded following the 2012 season. "I've had a very productive relationship with the team over the past year even though I knew I wasn't going to be technically or formally involved with the organization. I wanted my time off. I wanted to go home, spend some time with my family and take my summer vacation and just kind of take some time to take a deep breath from the game. As it turns out it didn't really work that way. I watched pretty much every game I could."
So after a season of watching games on television and running through scenarios of how he would have done things, Young is back in an official capacity with the club. He's already been unofficially on the clock as he had a hand in the hiring process of new manager Jeff Banister.
Young's roles will vary but the one he's looking forward to most is working with the minor leaguers in the organization. He expects to be in uniform for the club in spring training and start working with young players.
"We kind of mapped out this role, working with minor league kids was something I was really interested in," he said. "There are a ton of things you learn and I feel like it's wasted if you don't pass it down. I'm really looking forward to those days in spring training or our instructional league. If I get to know a kid well enough by a simple phone conversation or text we can have a positive impact on their career. Or even on their day."
Young went to two World Series with the Rangers, made seven All-Star teams and was named the club's player of the year five times. There were some contentious times between Young and the front office though, as Young didn't appreciate the way Daniels handling his change of positions and demanded a trade.
But those rifts are no more. Daniels joked Wednesday that Young had volunteered to handle all the tough conversations involving player moves.
Young made it clear Thursday that the past is the past.
"When you step away from the game, at least from my personal experience, I like to think that anything that happens you can kind of learn from," Young said. "It seems to me in the sports world if something gets out in the public people try to make that kind of a defining moment for a person. I never really subscribed to that theory. I don't think it is. I think it's a learning opportunity. Learn from it and move on and hopefully improve yourself down the road. That's the way I chose to do it."
Young is just the latest addition to a star-studded staff of special assistants on the club that also includes Darren Oliver, Ivan Rodriguez, Hall of Famer Greg Maddux and Tony Fernandez.
Daniels joked that the Rangers would have a very strong intramural softball team with the names he has working for him. He's also eager to see the impact Young can have on the club in a different role than one fans at Globe Life Park are accustomed to seeing him in.
"We've got a lot of really talented people, smart people, scouts, development staff, front-office folks," Daniels said. "We don't really have a lot of the player perspective in our group. At the same time Michael is not just kind of the old school field mentality only. I think he's pretty well-rounded. And has existing relationships with the organization to where it was a pretty easy transition. Quite frankly, he jumped in and was part of the manager interview process before we even finalized his deal to rejoin us. It was a very easy thing to get going. Between Michael, Ollie, Pudge, now you've got some guys with playing backgrounds, Ranger backgrounds, ties to the organization but also have existing relationships with us in the front office and you don't have to build that over time."
• Daniels said the club has interviewed a couple of candidates for the vacant third-base coaching job but that nothing is imminent.
• Texas pitching coach Mike Maddux heads to Los Angeles Thursday before leaving for Japan where he will be the pitching coach for a team of MLB All-Stars.
