Ray Montgomery didn’t want to get his first managerial job the way he got it, promoted to the interim job with the Angels when Ron Washington took a medical leave in June that will last the rest of the season.
But the Bronxville native and former Fordham standout said he appreciated being back in New York on Monday night in his new role, managing against the Mets, his childhood team.
“Any time you come back home, it’s special,” said Montgomery, who played in 47 games as an outfielder and pinch hitter in parts of three seasons with the Astros from 1996-98.
And while he’d been to Citi Field as a coach prior to Monday, his memories in Queens go back a lot further.
He said he went to Shea Stadium as a fan “quite a bit, as much as I could” growing up in Westchester, where he starred at Archbishop Stepinac High School.
“That window for the Mets, from about 1985-89, was my junior year of high school to my sophomore year at college, and it was great,’’ said Montgomery, 55, before the Mets’ 7-5 win on Monday night. “Watching those teams and those players was always exciting.”
The only downside, Montgomery said, was that it was a lot harder to get good seats once the team started winning.
“We used to get seats anywhere we wanted for a decade,” Montgomery said. “That changed pretty fast.”
His play at Fordham resulted in Montgomery becoming a 13th-round pick by the Astros in the 1990 amateur draft, and he made his MLB debut in 1996.
“It was a grind,” Montgomery said of his journey to the majors. “I had to work. I wasn’t as talented as some other guys. But I wouldn’t trade any of it.”
It led to scouting jobs with the Brewers and Diamondbacks before Montgomery became the director of player personnel for the Angels in 2020.
He moved to bench coach a year later and took over for Washington in June.
“This was something that was a goal after I left the front office,” Montgomery said. “But this isn’t the way you want to get it. We’re all just focused on doing our jobs.”
