The Rockies’ the search for a front office leader will drag on into the offseason. Patrick Saunders of The Denver Post reports that the Rox do not plan to announce their baseball activities until next week. The World Series ends Saturday at the latest, but the Rockies are apparently content with being at least a few days offseason without a GM present.
Colorado has no free agents eligible for a qualifying offer. Their options decisions are easy calls to buy out Kyle Farmer And Thairo Estrada. Not having a GM for any of these moves is not a problem. However, there is a lot of waiver activity in the first five days of the offseason as teams have to cut their rosters down to 40 without the injured list. Colorado has the top waiver priority as the worst team in the league. It would be ideal to have a permanent leader of baseball operations for those opportunities, but it doesn’t seem like they will be in place for that rush. The GM will also have to oversee a management search process that could take weeks. Guardians assistant general manager Matt Forman and Diamondbacks AGM Amiel Sawdaye are among the finalists to replace Bill Schmidt in the GM chairmanship.
While we wait for Colorado’s decision, we take a look at a few teams that have made minor front office or coaching moves.
- The Pirates parted ways with vice president of player performance John Baker, reports Jason Mackey of The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Baker was a former big league catcher and spent the past five seasons with the Bucs. He spent his first four years as the organization’s farm director before moving into the more nebulous player role last winter. Michael Chernow replaced Baker as director of player development in January.
- There are a number of changes coming to Oli Marmol’s coaching group with the Cardinals. Katie Woo of The Athletic reports that assistant pitching coach Dean Kiekhefer and game-planning coach Packy Elkins will be reassigned to quarterback roles. Woo noted that the Cards plan to hire an assistant pitching coach and an assistant hitting coach later in the offseason. She also writes that the club will attract new employees in international scouting and player development. Cardinals fans will want to read the full column, including quotes from new president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom about building their front office infrastructure without replacing most of the key staffers from the John Mozeliak era.
- The Tigers hire Alex Smith away from the Cubs to work as their vice president of baseball strategy, report The Athletic’s Sahadev Sharma and Patrick Mooney. Smith was part of Craig Counsell’s staff with the somewhat vague title of strategy coach. Smith had spent three seasons on Chicago’s MLB staff: one under David Ross and two with Counsell. Sharma and Mooney write that he was largely tasked with helping the coaches integrate data into their preparation. The Cornell product returns to a front office after working in the Cubs’ analytics department from 2015 to 2022, where he worked alongside Detroit president of baseball operations Scott Harris for two years. Harris had served as Chicago’s assistant general manager in 2018-19.
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