Oakland Athletics decide to hire Chili Davis as hitting coach – MLB News
The Oakland Athletics on Saturday, November 26, hired Chili Davis as their new hitting coach of the club. This move is expected to bring about a refreshing change and also completed the Athletics’ staff for the next season.
Interestingly, Davis has remained a team-mate of the serving team manager Bob Melvin in the San Francisco Giants. Having remained a hitting coach for Triple-A Pawtucket’s of Boston Red Sox, he has also remained the part time hitting coach for the Los Angeles
Dodgers instructional league.
On Saturday, after being hired by the Oakland Athletics, Davis commented on his move.
"The desire to teach has always been there," Davis said. "I love the interaction with players, and I love the game -- watching the game, talking about the game, anything."
For Davis, signing the contract was indeed a good thing. The fact that he loves the Bay Area is important as he had started his career there.
"This couldn't happen at a better place in a better area," Davis said. "I've always loved the Bay Area. I started my career there, and I think part of the huge excitement for me is that I am in the Bay Area and I get to spend time there again."
Davis had an impressive career when he was part of the Major League. Having remained the three-time All-Star slugger, he had a wonderful batting average of .274 with 350 homers to his credit.
In his 19 seasons of his career, he had 1,372 RBIs with a .451 slugging percentage – scoring 1,240 runs in the 2,436 games that he appeared as part of the different teams.
Davis has a lot to bring with himself as being fifth in the records of the most homers in MLB, sixth in RBIs and eighth in walks. With such a record, he indeed is ideally suited to reinvigorate the Oakland Athletics at a time when the team could not even
qualify for the playoffs this year. It will be interesting to see what impact Davis will have on the Athletics and if he can pull them out of their slump.
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