White Sox given green light to interview two Rangers coaches

On the heels of reporting earlier Thursday that the White Sox had interest in Rangers bench coach and offensive coordinator Donnie Ecker for their managerial vacancy, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News passes along that the Rangers have granted not only Ecker but also associate manager Will Venable permission to interview with Chicago regarding their available managerial gig. Venable’s name first surfaced in connection with the White Sox last week.

Ecker, 38, got his start as a coach in 2015 with the Cardinals. He acted as a minor league hitting coach for St. Louis from 2015 to 2017 before joining the Angels’ Triple-A club in that same role for the 2018 season. He first cracked the big leagues as an assistant hitting coach with the Reds in 2019. He remained with the club for two years before joining the Giants as a hitting coach prior to the 2020 season and he stuck in San Francisco for another two years before again changing organizations to join the Rangers in his current role as bench coach and offensive coordinator prior to the 2022 season.

It’s a lengthy resume and Ecker would bring perspectives from five different big league organizations to an infamously insular White Sox club if hired. This isn’t the first time Ecker has come up as a potential managerial candidate for a big league club, either. Last winter, Ecker was rumored among the potential candidates to replace Gabe Kapler as manager in San Francisco before they ultimately hired Bob Melvin away from the Padres.

Venable has also seen his name come up in past managerial searches and has long been looked at as one of the league’s top up-and-coming potential managers. After playing parts of nine seasons in the majors, Venable joined the Cubs as a special assistant to the front office in 2017 before serving as first base coach in the following two seasons and third base coach during the shortened 2020 campaign. Venable departed Chicago following the 2020 season to become Alex Cora’s bench coach in Boston. He remained in that role for two years before joining the Rangers as an associate manager under Bruce Bochy prior to the 2023 season.

Grant notes that Venable could be the leading contender to take Bochy’s place as manager in Texas when the 69-year-old eventually returns to retirement. Venable was seemingly comfortable with that arrangement when he declined interviews with the Mets and Guardians last winter in order to remain with the Rangers, but it’s possible he’s more seriously considering departing the Rangers this winter amid uncertainty regarding Bochy’s plans for the future. As Grant relays, Bochy told reporters following the end of the 2024 regular season that managing still “drives” him, seemingly leaving the door open to him sticking around beyond the end of his current contract in 2025.

The two Rangers coaches are hardly the only candidates connected to the job, of course. Dodgers first base coach Clayton McCullough and bench coach Danny Lehman, Tigers bench coach George Lombard, Padres special assistant A.J. Ellis, former Angels skipper Phil Nevin, Cardinals bench coach Daniel Descalso and outgoing Marlins manager Skip Schumaker have all been name checked as potential candidates in the rumor mill, with Schumaker and McCullough getting particular attention as potential leading candidates.

Whoever ultimately takes the reins in Chicago will enter a tumultuous situation. Not only is the club coming off a disastrous 2024 campaign that set the modern record for losses in a single season at 121, but the club’s ownership could be up in the air following a report Wednesday that indicated longtime owner Jerry Reinsdorf is discussing selling the club to a group led by former big leaguer Dave Stewart. While all that uncertainty and the likely long timetable for a return to contention could make the club’s managerial gig seem somewhat unattractive, the relative scarcity of big league manager jobs is sure to draw the attention of quality talent nonetheless.