HOUSTON -- Just a few miles separate Phil Garner and A.J. Hinch.
The managers both live in The Woodlands, a Houston suburb of nearly 107,000 where Hinch has settled his family during his first season as Astros skipper. Hinch's playing and managerial career spans the country, but Houston is the farthest south the Oklahoma native's professional baseball career brings him.
Garner, the revered manager who led the franchise to its only World Series appearance in 2005, knows the plight Hinch faced. Managerial stints in Milwaukee and Detroit preceded his time in Houston, so being the new man in charge in an unfamiliar baseball-crazed city was familiar.