By Tim Kelly, Sports Talk Philly editor 
Ruben Amaro Sr., who spent much of his life in the Philadelphia Phillies organization, has passed away at the age of 81, the club announced Friday.
We are saddened to hear about the passing of Ruben Amaro Sr.
Our thoughts and prayers are with his family. pic.twitter.com/cBnOj6C6sB
— Phillies (@Phillies) March 31, 2017
While Amaro's son, former Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro Jr., is more well known to fans for his rise through the Phillies organization, the elder Amaro had quite a run in the organization as well. He played six of his 11 major league seasons with the Phillies, spending time at various different infield positions.
According to SABR, Amaro spent 1972-1980 serving primarily as the Phillies head scout in the Caribbean area, before eventually spending 1980 and 1981 as the team's first base coach, meaning he was the first base coach for the first team in franchise history to win a World Series. In 1982, he became the organization's director of Latin American affairs, a role that he served in for one season.
Over the next decade and a half, Amaro worked in various roles in the Chicago Cubs and Detroit Tigers organizations, before he eventually returned to the Phillies organization in 1999, where he spent two years working as a minor league coach. He did have a two-year stint working as the manager of the GCL Phillies, but Amaro spent much of the 2000s working as a special assignment scout, which isn't all that different from the role that the Phillies occasionally use Charlie Manuel in now. Obviously the Phillies did very well in their scouting in the early 2000s, and his SABR bio specifically says that he helped to scout eventual World Series MVP Cole Hamels.
Most recently, Amaro spent three years (2010-2012) in the Houston Astros organization as a part-time scout. Though it's unclear exactly how much of a role Amaro had, it's clear by the amount of talent the the Astros now have that the organization was extremely successful in their scouting at that time.
Amaro's passing comes just over a week after the passing of former manager Dallas Green, who Amaro coached with and assisted in multiple other ways throughout the course of his career in the sport. The Phillies plan to wear a patch honoring Green this season and it doesn't seem out of the question that they will add a second one to honor Amaro.
Sports Talk Philly send our condolences to the Amaro family during this difficult time.
