© Kirby Lee | 2017 May 24
Former Giants director of baseball operations and Dodgers general manager Ned Colletti has made a surprising return to the sports world, taking a job as a scout for the San Jose Sharks. His primary tasks will be scouting players at the American Hockey League and NHL levels.
Colletti served in the Giants front office from 1994 to 2005, with the team compiling a 813–644 overall record (.558) during his tenure. Colletti became the Dodgers’ GM in 2005, and had the highest winning percentage of any GM in the National League during his nine years in LA.
Colletti joined John Lund on Friday to discuss the interesting career change.
“I’ve followed the sport of hockey for years and dug deep into it for really decades,” Colletti said. “A lot of world junior tournaments. I spent countless hours in GM offices, coaches offices trying to dig deep. I’ve known Doug Wilson for a long time. We kicked this idea around for a little bit and he presented the idea and I thought, ‘you know this is the opportunity of a lifetime.’ I get to use what I’ve learned, I get to be a part of an organization I deeply respect with people I have a lot of respect for.
“I think a lot of business is people, and it’s really reading people and reading, how they prepare, how they play with others, whatever the sport is, and really who’s inside the uniform. And I think I’ve obviously studied that for 40 years on the on the baseball side.
“To really see who plays and who doesn’t and who’s capable of what, and I think it is, your character counts, things like that. I think that that transcends more than sports. That’s life. And I think that the sports are very, very similar. I know my conversations with Doug or with other NHL GMs and leaders, we always come back to some of the same challenges and some of the same successes.”
Listen to the full interview below.
