1:15pm: The Brewers have announced Stearns at a press conference (you can follow along the live video stream of the conference here).
SEPT. 21, 9:43am: Stearns will be introduced as the new general manager today at 1pm CT, tweets MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy.
SEPT. 20: The Brewers are expected to name Astros assistant GM David Stearns as their new GM, Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports tweets. Stearns will indeed be the next GM in Milwaukee, Brian McTaggart of MLB.com tweets, and he adds that a formal announcement will come on Monday.
Stearns, 30, will now become the youngest GM in baseball. He is, in fact, younger than seven players on the Brewers’ current roster (Ryan Braun, Matt Garza, Kyle Lohse, Adam Lind, Nevin Ashley, Francisco Rodriguez and Cesar Jimenez). As an assistant GM in Houston, he was tasked with assisting GM Jeff Luhnow in “all baseball operations capacities including player evaluations, player transactions, and contract negotiations,” per his site bio. The Harvard grad served as the director of baseball operations for the Indians in 2011/12 and has previously worked in the baseball operations departments of the Mets and Pirates.
Stearns is “adored by his colleagues,” Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports tweets. Despite his academic background, Passan notes that he is “far from an all-analytics guy.”
In August, it was announced that longtime Brewers GM Doug Melvin would move to an advisory position within the organization. Melvin, 63, became Milwaukee’s general manager nearly 13 years ago and prior to that spent eight years as GM of the Rangers. He was the GM in Texas for the team’s first three postseason appearances and helped to construct a pair of playoff teams during his Brewers tenure as well, including a 96-win team that made it to Game 6 of the NLCS against the Cardinals in 2011.
The Brewers have conducted an exhaustive search to fill their GM vacancy, but it seems that they have found their man before the official end to the season. The team was known to be focusing on candidates who were both younger and had an analytics background. Rays VP of baseball operations Chaim Bloom, Pirates director of player development Tyrone Brooks, A’s assistant GM Dan Kantrovitz and the Brewers’ own scouting director Ray Montgomery were all names linked to Milwaukee’s GM opening.
Photo courtesy of the Brewers media relations department.
Wow, only 30 years old. Hope it works out. If nothing else, credit to the Brewers for being bold and trying something new.
There is no way a 30 year old should be the GM of any major league team. Talk about being in over your head. I don’t care if he went to Harvard, Yale or the school of hard knocks, you need to have experienced or been a close eye witness to the ups and downs of business and baseball to understand how to avoid the big “uh ohs”. Speaking of which, uh oh, I think I just got jelly on my pajamas.
Both Joe Daniels of the Rangers and Theo Epstein of Red Sox and now Cubs were both 28 when they were given the GM title. They both have done well for themselves. I generally agree with your sentiment but there are always exceptions and the Brewers feel the same about this guy.
Jon Daniels, Andrew Friedman and Theo Epstein were all hired at 28. Alex Anthopoulos was barely 32.
Stearns is widely respected and has worked for the commissioner’s office as well as four other Major League teams before being appointed to this post. The Brewers clearly didn’t feel he will be over his head after multiple waves of interviews, each of which Mark Attanasio said lasted more than three hours.
There are teams of people who prepare candidates for interviews professionally. Good interviews don’t always translate into good results.
Yes but that can happen to any candidate, regardless of age, which is the topic that started this conversation.
Considering the Indians records in 2011 and especially 2012 (94 losses), one has to wonder at the wisdom of the Brewers’ confidence in this guy. Sure, he has an Ivy League pedigree and is ‘adored’ by his colleagues. But he was still in college 8 years ago.
Let’s look at this from the owner’s point of view. These whiz kids are making money for the owners. I’m not sure they are producing quality baseball across the board. You see more and more players who cannot execute fundamentals at the major league level and these bad habits continue as long as the player’s individual stats are up. Too many baseball fans equate the game with fantasy leagues. The dollar is the driver.
Did the kids get off your lawn yet? Kreiky mate, how does the Whiz Kids equate to the game lacking fundamentals and too many fans equate the game with fantasy leagues, sure you’re in the right location grandpa? NFL rumors is right next door.
I hope he takes his first paycheck and gets a suit from somewhere other than Men’s Warehouse. Man, what am I doing with my life?
Cool. Super young but that’s great. Hopefully for young fans out there who dream of one day being in the bigs as a GM, it will further reinforce just how key education is.
I’m also a fan of the baseball sense here. Considering that this year’s Astros team was a few years in the making, it’s easy to see how this guy probably had a big role in the success. Best of luck.