WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- You'll be hard-pressed to find a more hands-on president of business operations in baseball than Reid Ryan, who one minute is greeting fans in the stands and the next is doing interviews with the press on the field.
The 45-year-old Ryan was named Astros president on May 17, 2013.
This offseason, the club has turned things around and is considered a contender in the American League following the additions of Carlos Beltran, Brian McCann and Josh Reddick. Ryan has overseen a revamped center field at Minute Maid Park and the building of a new Spring Training complex in West Palm Beach.
Ryan was at camp when he took time with MLB.com to provide his three main messages to Astros fans going into the 2017 season:
"The messages that we have for the fans this year is, one, we're going to have an exciting team on the field. The moves that [general manager] Jeff [Luhnow] made this offseason to bring in a veteran presence with the good young core group of players we have, in addition to Beltran and McCann and Reddick, people know we're going to score runs and going to be an exciting team. We're really looking forward to the season.
"The second thing is we have a few things in the works for Astros fans from our Spring Training complex here in West Palm Beach that's just opening up, to the fact we're going to have a new center-field area at Minute Maid Park. Fans are going to come out and experience the Astros as they never have before, both here in Spring Training and at Minute Maid Park.
"And last, this year our slogan is 'Earn it,' and it's really what the fans have wanted to hear, that we had an aspirational plan for this club, that we wanted to go out and win a championship and win a World Series. The rebuild is over. This core group of players is here, and our guys are here in Spring Training trying to earn it. We're going to do it every single day, and we want the fans to come out and see this club this year and be a part of this journey. So we think it's going to be an exciting year, and we can't wait to get going on Opening Day."