Executive Vice President & General Manager
Chris Young joined the Texas Rangers as Executive Vice President & General Manager on December 4, 2020. The 44-year-old Young assumed leadership of the Rangers’ entire baseball operations group on August 17, 2022.
The franchise’s 63-year drought without a World Series Championship ended on November 1, 2023, when the Rangers defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks in the fifth and deciding game of the Fall Classic. That concluded an historical postseason run that saw Texas go 13-4 in the A.L. Wild Card, Division and League Championship Series and the World Series, including an 11-0 record on the road.
Young is the first former Major League player to win the World Series in a head baseball operations role since Kenny Williams of the Chicago White Sox in 2005. He is also the first individual to earn a World Series crown as both a player (Kansas City in 2015) and a General Manager/Baseball Operations Chief since Johnny Murphy, who pitched on seven championship teams with the New York Yankees (1932, 1936-39, 1941, 1943) and won the Fall Classic as the General Manager with the New York Mets in 1969.
After hiring three-time World Series champion Bruce Bochy as the Rangers’ manager in October 2022, Young fortified Texas’ starting pitching with the free agent signings of Jacon deGrom, Nathan Eovaldi, and Andrew Heaney last winter. Young’s midseason additions via trade of pitchers Aroldis Chapman, Jordan Montgomery, Max Scherzer, and Chris Stratton also played a key role in Texas’ improvement from 68 to 90 regular season victories in 2023.
The Rangers also received significant contributions from a number of home-grown players including third baseman Josh Jung and outfielders Evan Carter and Leody Taveras. In recognition of the team’s overall on-field accomplishments, Baseball America selected the Rangers as its 2023 Organization of the Year, Texas’ first such honor since 1989.
A veteran of 13 Major League seasons as a right-handed pitcher with five clubs, Young is the ninth General Manager in Rangers history and joins Eddie Robinson (1976-82) and Tom Grieve (1984-94) as former MLB players to hold that position. He joins Boston’s Craig Breslow, Seattle’s Jerry Dipoto and Chris Getz of the Chicago White Sox as the only former Major Leaguers to currently oversee baseball operations for a MLB organization.
Prior to joining the Rangers, Young spent three years working for Major League Baseball and was promoted to Senior Vice President, Baseball Operations in February 2020. In that role, he oversaw the On-Field Operations and Umpiring Departments and served as the league’s principal liaison to Major League managers regarding play on the field. He worked on the application of playing rules and regulations, on-field standards and discipline, pace of play and other special projects.
He worked closely with the Rangers on baseball issues related to the construction of Globe Life Field and oversaw the on-field operations for the three rounds of the 2020 MLB playoffs in Arlington. Young originally joined Major League Baseball as Vice President in May 2018.
Young posted a 79-67 record with a 3.95 ERA in 271 games/221 starts with Texas (2004-05), San Diego (2006-10), New York Mets (2011-12), Seattle (2014), and Kansas City (2015-17). Originally selected by Pittsburgh in the third round of the 2000 MLB draft, he was traded to Montreal in December 2002 and then to Texas in April 2004. The right-hander made seven starts in his first Major League action in 2004 and was selected as the Rangers Rookie of the Year in 2005, leading the staff in starts (31) and strikeouts (137) and ranking second in wins (12) and innings (164.2).
Traded to San Diego in January 2006, he posted the National League’s lowest opponents’ batting average in both 2006 and 2007 and was a member of the 2007 N.L. All-Star Team.
Hampered by injuries for much of the next six seasons, Young matched his career high with 12 wins in 2014 at Seattle and was named as the A.L. Comeback Player of the Year by MLB and The Sporting News.
Young spent his final three big league seasons with Kansas City, winning 11 games for the 2015 World Champion Royals. He pitched 15.2 innings throughout K.C.’s Postseason run, working 3.0 innings of hitless relief en route to the win in a 14-inning victory over the New York Mets in Game 1 of the World Series. In 2018, he went to spring training with San Diego but was released at the end of March and retired as an active player.
Young starred in both baseball and basketball over two seasons each at Princeton University, earning Ivy League Rookie of the Year honors as a 6’10” center in basketball and a pitcher in baseball in 1999, the first male athlete in Ivy League history to win those honors in two sports. He was 9-1, 1.64 in his two years for the Tigers baseball team and finished with 801 points, 350 rebounds, and 142 blocked shots while starting all 60 basketball games from 1998-2000.
He graduated from Princeton in 2002 with a BA in politics after beginning his pro baseball career. Young wrote his senior thesis on the impact of the life of Hall of Famer Jackie Robinson on racial stereotypes. He is a native of Dallas and a 1998 graduate of Highland Park High School where he earned All-State honors in both basketball and baseball in his senior year. Young was inducted into the HPHS Athletic Hall of Fame in April 2023 and had his baseball number retired by the school in January 2024.
Chris resides in Dallas with his wife Liz, daughter Catherine, and sons Scott and Grant. Liz’ father, Dick Patrick has been an executive with the NHL’s Washington Capitals since 1982 and currently serves as Team Chairman and Vice Chairman of Monumental Sports & Entertainment. Her great grandfather, NHL Hall of Famer Lester Patrick was a longtime coach and General Manager of the New York Rangers.