Rangers coach Mike Maddux is quite familiar with newest Ranger Dave Bush. Maddux coached Bush while he was in Milwaukee, a span which included consecutive 12-win seasons. Bush agreed to terms on a minor league deal that will pay him $1 million base if he makes the major league club and he could earn another $1 million in incentives. Here are some of Maddux's thoughts on Bush.

Q: Talk about what makes Dave Bush a pitcher that can compete for a spot on the roster in spring training.

Maddux: His desire. He pitches above his skill set a lot of times because he has a great desire to win, a great desire to compete. He’s got a wrestler’s mentality. It’s about preparation, dedication and execution when you go out there. The thing about Bushie is that you can’t ever count him out. He’ll surprise a lot of people. If you look on paper, we’ve got some talented individuals in front of him right now. But there’s the old Army Sergeant that says, 'I’ve got a lot of fight in me.'

Q: What does he throw?

Maddux: He throws two different fastballs, a curve ball and a changeup. He throws a cutter or a sinker. He’s going to throw all of his pitches and can throw them for strikes and change speeds and fight until the end.

Q: I noticed that in 2009 he was on the disabled list twice with arm fatigue, but he did make 31 starts last year. Are you confident he's over any kind of arm issue?

Maddux: He’s healthy. What happened is in 2009, he started off doing what he always does. He starts off as the fourth starter, then you’re relying on him every five days to keep you going. He got hit by a line drive in the triceps. He just kept trying to pitch with it and it never got better. He went on the DL and he had some issues with the healing process of it and that set him back. He lost his velocity, but his competitive nature said that he was going to pitch. It didn’t go the way he wanted, but he was taking a squirt gun to the gun fight.

Q: Talk about how important starting pitching depth is during the course of a season.

Maddux: I think it’s the cruise control of your automobile in that you keep pushing forward. You don’t have that big slide if you have people you can continually keep plugging in. You never really lose momentum. Depth is a great thing. There are some teams that might have co-No. 1s or strong Nos. 1, 2 and 3, but in the back end they are soft and if one of those guys gets hurt, they have gaping holes. We're fairly solid 1 through 8 and we can maintain our consistency night after night. We have depth that goes eight or nine deep.