The Angels have hired Marcus Thames as their new hitting coach, along with a new assistant hitting coach in Phil Plantier and a new assistant pitching coach in Bill Hezel.
Angels manager Phil Nevin previously worked with Thames when the two were with the New York Yankees. Both were fired by the Yankees following the 2021 season.
Thames is a former major leaguer who played left field, first base and was a designated hitter. He spent most of his career with the Detroit Tigers and also played for the Dodgers, Yankees and Texas Rangers. He spent last season as the Miami Marlins hitting coach.
He previously worked for four years as the Yankees hitting coach and as an assistant hitting coach in New York two seasons before that. The 2022 Marlins offense ranked 27th in on-base-plus-slugging rate and batting average. The 2021 Yankees ranked 13th in OPS and 23rd in batting average, but were top five in OPS in 2020, top five in both those categories in 2019 and had the second-best OPS in 2018.
Plantier was also a former Yankees coach, spending the 2018-19 season with their minor league affiliate in Scranton Wilkes-Barre. He spent last season with the Marlins' minor league affiliate in Jacksonville.
Hezel was the director of pitching at Driveline Baseball, the popular offseason training facility for players, including Angels two-way star Shohei Ohtani.
The Angels announced that Mike Gallego, Dom Chiti and Paul Sorrento would be reassigned within the organization.
