The Washington Nationals announced tonight that Randy Knorr would be Davey Johnson's bench coach in 2012. Pat Corrales served as Johnson's bench coach in 2011, but will return to his role as a roving instructor. Knorr, 43, who retired in 2001 after an 11-season MLB career with the Blue Jays, Astros, Marlins, Rangers and Expos, "... has spent the last seven seasons as either a big league coach or minor league manager in the Nationals organization," as the Nats noted in a press release announcing Knorr's promotion...
" Knorr has posted a 384-380 (.503) minor league managerial mark with winning records in three of his five full seasons as skipper. He began his career on the bench in 2005 with Savannah of the Single-A South Atlantic League.
"In 2008, his final of three seasons with Single-A Potomac, Knorr skippered the Nationals to their first-ever Carolina League Championship and the first domestic title won by a Nationals affiliate since the team relocated to The District in 2005. He also managed the Scottsdale Scorpions to a 2010 Arizona Fall League Championship.
"Knorr managed at Double-A Harrisburg and Triple-A Syracuse in 2010 and 2011, respectively.
"Knorr joins Washington’s big league coaching staff for the third time. He served as Nationals bullpen coach for the final three months of the 2006 season and the entire ’09 campaign."
The rest of Johnson's staff remains the same.
Rick Eckstein returns as the Nats' hitting coach. Steve McCatty's back as the pitching coach. Jim Lett's back as the bullpen coach, Bo Porter as the third base coach and Trent Jewett as the first base coach. Johnson's return to the bench was announced last month, and Johnson told ESPN980's Thom Loverro and Kevin Sheehan a few weeks back that he thought there were some, "... really good baseball people in our system and I think the best thing in a system is ideally you develop some future managers and future big league coaches from within the system, because they know the talent and they kind of continue the way you play the game of baseball."
Over his seven years in the Nationals' organization, Knorr, as the Nats' pointed out in the press release tonight, "... has worked with 75 percent of the players on Washington’s current 40-man roster, including: Ian Desmond, Danny Espinosa, John Lannan, Drew Storen, Stephen Strasburg, Chien-Ming Wang, Ryan Zimmerman and Jordan Zimmermann." Recent reports said that it wasn't likely that next bench coach would come from outside the organization, but the Nats' apparently decided to promote from within. Johnson's stated clearly that he thinks he's the right man for the job in 2012. Who'll take over after that remains to be seen, but as the Nats and Johnson have stated the next manager is likely going to be on the major league coaching staff this season.