Having just begun to look for a new baseball operations leader, the Phillies have at least some interest in Marlins manager (and recent GM) Dan Jennings, Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald reports (Twitter links). Philadelphia has yet to request permission to interview Jennings, who is not only still manning the dugout in Miami but reportedly has an offer on the table to step back into the GM role there. It’s a complicated situation already, but interest from the Phillies, who have quite an appealing GM opportunity up for grabs, would be an interesting wild card.
Here’s more from the NL East:
- Outgoing Phillies president Pat Gillick says he’s not sure what he’ll pursue next, as MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki reports. “At this point, I haven’t even thought about it,” said the long-time, 78-year-old executive. Gillick also acknowledged that he was not surprised that his replacement, Andy MacPhail, had decided to find a new GM rather than keeping Ruben Amaro Jr. “I don’t think … the public would really accept that,” said Gillick, who has long been a supporter of the deposed Amaro. “That wasn’t the reason the decision was made, but certainly the fans and the public play into every organization in the sports industry.”
- The Marlins hope to avoid the recent Matt Harvey controversy with their own ace, Jose Fernandez, as Spencer writes. Both pitchers, of course, are in their first seasons back from Tommy John surgery. Fernandez himself says he does not foresee any difficulties in working out an approach before the season, noting that he expects the team will meet with his agent (Scott Boras, as with Harvey) and medical experts to arrive at an agreement. The young righty added that a plan was in place this year, had the Fish remained in contention, to help limit the strain on his recently-replaced UCL while maximizing his value to the club.
- The Braves recently designated and then released right-hander David Aardsma, and he has penned an interesting piece on the subject at Baseball Essential. We cover an awful lot of DFAs here, and it’s easy to forget that there is a person involved who faces a potentially life-changing impact. Aardsma walks through the process from the awkward moment of hitting DFA limbo through the battle to stay prepared for another opportunity. It’s a great read and well worth your time.
That’s a really great read on Aardsma and many thanks for linking it here Jeff. Good insight on how a ballplayer prepares for life on the outside looking back in.
One of the power pitching guys who underwent TJ and didn’t regain his velocity. It hurt him a lot. filthy splitter and that FB was pretty much all he had. A favorite of mine since his Boston and Seattle days.
I would say the Marlins would love to be in the same situation as Harvey and the Mets… that would mean they’re in the playoffs
I always accepted the fact that Gillick would never publicly denounce Amaro since he’s a class act (my grandfather knew him in the early 90s), but it’s nice to see him able to acknowledge the necessity to sack him from a PR perspective.
It can’t be proven but it’s pretty likely that Aardsma is right about his contract being the deciding factor in his DFA/Release. That was a really good read and helped put back some perspective on how hard it is to stick around in the bigs. Hopefully he finds an opportunity to play next year.
Yeah that was interesting to read for sure. Its really ugly thing for the braves to do; though to be fair, i’m sure a lot of other clubs would have done the same thing.