Rangers hire Bret Boone as new Hitting Instructor

The Rangers announced Monday that they are bringing in 14 year veteran, 3 time All-Star, and 2 time Silver Slugger Bret Boone to become the Rangers’ lead hitting instructor for the remainder of the season. The news comes less than 24 hours after the club announced the firing of lead hitting instructor Donnie Ecker whose role Boone will now take the reins of. 

Boone is no stranger to success in the Big leagues, spending his 14 year career with Seattle, Cincinnati, and some very brief stints with Atlanta, San Diego and Montreal at the later half of his career. He slugged 20 or more home runs 6 times, hitting 35 or more in 2 of them. 

Bret Boone revealed on his Podcast that this all started when he went to his alma mater USC to throw out the first pitch and happened to run into his friend and Rangers Legend and advisor Michael Young. After their discussion, Boone told Young to give his best to CY and Bochy, whom Boone had ties and great relationship with having played under Bochy for 1 year in 2000. It appeared Young, CY, and Bochy then had some conversation about bringing in the former slugger as a Hitting instructor as Bochy would then call Boone and offer him the role. 

Not only does Boone bring in his rich history of Baseball with him, but has been around some of the games best hitting in his career with the likes of Ichiro, Ken Griffey Jr, Kevin Mitchell, and Barry Larkin to just name a few. Boone will bring in a deep understanding of the Pitcher vs Batter battle both mentally and physically when stepping into that batters box. 

Boone has no prior experience in coaching and will be a risk by the Rangers. Just because a player is successful on the field doesn’t mean he will excel at coaching players in the reason they were successful in their journey and every hitter is different physically and mentally when stepping up to the plate. However, having a sinful career certainly doesn’t hurt the resume and CY and company surely know that.  

CY stated how Viele and Ecker had the same style and virtues in coaching and may have caused the lineup to focus too heavily on one side of the beam rather than balance out and become a more complete lineup and hitters at the plate. He’s hoping Boone can be what Mike Maddux is for the pitching staff and how he instills confidence in themselves. “It’s a good parallel. Mike has a unique skill set. One of the most important things is his ability to instill conviction, confidence, and belief in a pitcher. My belief is Bret is going to be able to coach in a similar fashion and have a similar impact on our hitting group.” 

This will be a big change for the Rangers hitting staff and will take effect immediately as Boone is set to join the club in Boston when the Rangers take on the Red Sox. As much as fans and the Rangers will want to see results immediately, things like this are gonna take time especially when switching over just a month into the season. Between his playing years and family history it’s hard to find a player who’s as deeply rooted into the game of Baseball as Bret Boone. 

The deal Boone signed is only for the remainder of the season and will be reevaluated once the season comes to an end. Now the Rangers will wait and see if Boone can instill some magic back into the Rangers lineup and provide a pitching staff who’s been as lockdown as they get with some much needed help. 

CY is officially not messing around and an early May coaching switch sure does prove it, now time will tell if they got the right guy or not for the job.