6:12pm: The Padres have formally announced Preller’s hiring, with his official title being “executive vice president/general manager.” Lead investor Peter Seidler offered the following statement: “Padres ownership is thrilled to welcome A.J. Preller to the Padres family. His balance of experience, knowledge and energy makes him the ideal person to lead our baseball operations as we work to build a consistent winner in San Diego.”
1:48pm: The deal is done, tweets MLB.com’s Corey Brock. San Diego says it will make an “organizational announcement” at Petco Park at 4pm PT.
12:54pm: Preller has agreed to a five-year pact with the Padres, reports Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com. Final details are still being worked out, but the agreement is in place.
11:59am: Preller has accepted the job, reports Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News.
THURSDAY, 10:56am: The sides are still negotiating the terms, with Preller yet to accept the position, reports ESPN.com’s Jerry Crasnick (Twitter links). Nevertheless, a deal is likely to be struck today, says Crasnick.
WEDNESDAY, 9:48pm: Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune hears that the Padres will make an official announcement regarding Preller’s hiring tomorrow.
9:11pm: The Padres have decided to hire Rangers assistant general manager A.J. Preller to fill their GM vacancy, sources tell Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports (Twitter link).
Preller had been one of four finalists for the vacancy, along with Red Sox assistant GM Mike Hazen, Yankees assistant GM Billy Eppler and MLB executive Kim Ng. Preller and Eppler were both rumored to be favorites for the job at different times, though the most recent reports had Eppler in the lead.
Instead, the Padres will go with Preller, who has been described as “eccentric” at time by peers, as Tom Krasovic of the San Diego Union-Tribune recently wrote. Krasovic also noted Preller’s aggressive nature when pursuing Latin American players on the amateur market. International scouting was said to be a priority for the Padres in their pursuit of a new GM, which led Peter Gammons to speculate that Preller could be the favorite. The Padres were said to prefer to hire an up-and-comer in the baseball operations world rather than someone with previous GM experience, and the 36-year-old Preller fits that bill.
This is hardly the first time that Preller was identified as a GM candidate. Back in 2011, MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes interviewed Preller as part of MLBTR’s GM Candidate series, touching on topics such as the Rangers’ low-cost acquisitions of Colby Lewis and Nelson Cruz, the decision to move C.J. Wilson to the rotation and the challenges the team faced in trading former cornerstone Mark Teixeira to the Braves.
I’m a fan of this decision. Not a Fryers fan but the Rangers seem to be running well (discounting an absurdly amount of injuries this year.) but I think the Padres GM job would be one of the last jobs is pick.
I’d pick
Friars*
Although Fryers would explain the San Diego Chicken.
And explain why Hodads, Jack in the Box, and the garlic fries are the favorite cuisine at the park.
Dont forget Rubio’s fish tacos. Hodads may be the best ballpark burger anywhere.
I think his name is Josh Preller. A.J. Hinch is the one that resigned today.
His name is AJ.
You are correct, thank you. In the earlier post about this subject, MLBTR called him Josh Preller so that’s what I was going on.
Looked back and saw that. Total mental lapse on my part while writing the previous post. I had Josh Byrnes on the brain or something when I wrote that post. It’s been corrected in that post, and his name is indeed A.J. Sorry for the confusion!
No worries whatsoever. You are entitled to one mistake a year.
Ha. Unfortunately it’s far more than that — but if you’ve only noticed one, I’ll take it! Don’t hesitate to point them out when you see them though. Last thing I ever want is incorrect information on the site.
Sad to see Preller go as a Ranger fan. We had a three headed monster of a front office with JD, AJ and Thad Levine. Success means you get poached though, Levine will be next.
Sad to see him go but of the three to lose he’s the one I’m the least sad about.
Very true. Not a bad thing to have a buddy GM on another team for future deals either.
Interesting hire. The most polarizing candidate of the four. For having to get a “sure thing” it seems like the riskiest choice on the surface. Time will tell
Quickest 48 hours decision ever.
and Kim ng gets passed up once again…
Yeh. The MLB has long been populated by folks who are entrenched in “tradition”. Looking at the resistance to change (from integration back in the 1940’s, to giving sincere consideration to more minorities for management roles (back in the 90’s, I guess), to instant replay in recent times, plus the fact that it is such an inbred business), kind of puts the mentality in perspective. A large percentage of those working in baseball are just dedicated to keeping things the same. Hence, in a “culture” like that, hiring Ng would take a kind of guts and open-mindedness that clearly nobody in the League has today. Sad.
I agree that Ng is getting shafted by the old boys club of MLB management and ownership, but Preller isn’t exactly a “traditional” pick either.
Do you really think the signing of Preller is because they’re not open-minded enough to sign Ng? Surely it’s more pragmatic than that – they want to focus on international scouting, and that was his priority for a while with the Rangers.
This wasn’t a crusade against Kim, but she didn’t have the skillset or priorities that they wanted.
To be clear (and this is for @iheartyourfart:disqus also), the comment I responded to was: and Kim ng gets passed up once again…
In keeping with that, my statement refers to the entire history of Ng having been passed over for a GM position. Someone of her accomplishments would very likely have been given a shot a long time ago, had she been male. So that (and not the selection of Preller per sé) is the context of the comment.
Okay, I see. Thanks for clarifying.
In that context your statement makes more sense. Have a good day.
What exactly makes her a good fit for the job?
Hasn’t she been on the shortlist for like six different GM vacancies now? Must be really frustrating for her. I wonder if she’ll be under consideration to be the new commissioner?
EDIT – Googled it, and she isn’t one of the contenders for commish.
I think she has been working under joe torre for a few years now, so she’s in good hands at least.
nudge nudge
The Padres said all along that they wanted someone with strong scouting background, so I was very surprised to even see her make the 2nd round of interviews since she has none. Eventually she will get her shot, but the Padres really need help in player development which is not her forte.
I hope Preller makes a difference in the international market. The Padres have not had anyone from their Dominican facility contribute at the Major league level since it was established in 2008. Rymer Liriano MIGHT be the first later this year or next season if he keeps hitting well.
Is it really that surprising that a facility built for teenagers hasn’t produced major league production in just 6 years?
Double-edged question. Because we’re referring to the Padres you have to say no, it’s not surprising that not one D.R. player has been developed into a major leaguer to this point. But it is surprising in a purely generic way. To not have even one player from six years of work is sad. Sure, they are in there early 20’s but they’re not even knocking on the door other than possibly Liriano, who swings and misses too much.
Not really. You sign kids out of the DR at 16 usually right? So to get to the majors by 21 would be an exceptionally good prospect. Do you know of any that signed in 2009 that are in the majors?
Profar is the only one I can think of and he’s just barely contributing at the major league level. Also, people seem to be forgetting that Liriano lost a year of development to TJ surgery. Calling the facility a failure after 6 years is silly. They sign a handful or less of the top 16 year olds from Latin America most years. It’s a long road from 16 to the MLB for even the most talented kids. Liriano is having a big bounce back year and others could contribute in the near future such as Portillo, Asencio, and possibly even Galvez to a lesser extent.
Profar is not from the D.R. He’s from Curaçao.
Since this is an in season move, will Preller have any restrictions on use of confidential information he acquired while at Texas? I know some Texas stuff is all over the internet but just wondering if the Rangers have any ability to say “don’t use X”.
Thats an interesting question. They did say that there were restrictions on what personnel he could bring over this season, so I would bet that proprietary reports and information would also be restricted. The draft and the international free agent signing period are both over, so what information that might be would be interesting to find out.
Eccentric can be a very good thing in baeball. Let’s hope he helps the Padres get competitive.
They choose Popes faster than San Diego picked a GM. No wonder they call themselves The Friars
It’s all just part of JD’s master plan
We aren’t just talking about players from the DR. We are talking about International prospects in general that go to the Padres facility in the DR.