It was announced the other day by the beat writers covering the Rangers but the Rangers have announced their new pitching coach (es). The new Co-pitching coaches will be Doug Mathis and Brendan Sagara.
Mathis, who had a playing career with the Rangers will be in the dugout while Sagara will be in the bullpen. Mathis’ Major-League career spanned three years with the Rangers from 2008-2010. He had a career record of 3-3 with a 4.84 earned run average and a 0.3 bWAR. Statically, his best year was 2009 where he pitched 42.2 innings and had a 3.16 earned run average and a 1.148 WHIP.
Brendan Sagara pitched for the Evansville Otters, a team in the Independent Frontier league in 1999. According to baseball-reference, he pitched a total of 5.1 innings and allowed one run on 8 hits. After that he got into coaching and has been coaching in different levels since. He also has served as a scout. He was named the Nashville Sounds pitching coach for the 2020 season but as we know, the minor-league season was canceled.
I’m curious to see how the co-coaching will work among the pitching staff but the Rangers have had among the worst team era’s as a pitching staff in recent years. I really don’t have enough information to complain about the move but I can tell you, what the Rangers have been doing isn’t working so I’m on board for now. Who says the Rangers can’t be innovating?
Bobby Wilson has been named Catching Coach.
Wilson was named as the Frisco RoughRiders manager in December of 2019. He has now been promoted to the Rangers catching coach before he managed one game. In his playing career, Wilson had two stints with our Rangers. The first was in 2015 where he played in 31 games and hit 1 home run with 10 RBI. He rejoined the Rangers via trade in 2016 and he played 42 games, hit 3 home runs with 22 RBI.
I really Wilson as the catching coach, especially for the development of the catchers in our system, including Jose Trevino, Sam Huff and David Garcia. Someone with experience catching is critical.