One of the most logical places for the Braves to look for their new hitting coach was the Double Dime Ranch in Texas, and they did, Chipper Jones told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The former Braves third baseman said Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez contacted him recently to gauge his interest in the Braves’ hitting coach position, and Jones told him the timing wasn’t right.
“Fredi kind of took my temperature on it,” Jones said by phone from his hunting ranch in Southwest Texas, where he recently moved from Atlanta. “I’m not ready to get back in uniform yet. It’s too soon and I don’t know if I’d be dedicated enough to the job right now. …”
“I sat back and I started thinking about it. It’s even more of a time commitment from a coaching standpoint than it is a player standpoint. I don’t want to be at the park at noon every day. I don’t want to be at the park until midnight every night. I don’t want to wake up at spring training and have to be there at 6:30 in the morning. It’s a huge commitment, and I don’t want to cheat the organization at this point because I’m not ready to put that kind of time commitment into it.”
Jones, 42, is two years into retirement after his farewell season in 2012.
More to come from his interview with writer Carroll Rogers on MYAJC.com.
