The Diamondbacks have interest in Braves first base coach Eddie Perez for their managerial opening, David O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution tweets. Perez interviewed for the Braves managerial job that ultimately went to Brian Snitker, and he’s reportedly also recently attracted interest from the Rockies.
Perez spent 11 seasons as a catcher in the big leagues, spending much of that time working as Greg Maddux’s personal catcher in Atlanta. He also played a season apiece for the Indians and Brewers. He has worked as a coach in the Braves organization since 2006, and has managed in the Venezuelan Winter League.
We haven’t heard much about who will replace Chip Hale as the Diamondbacks’ manager, and perhaps for good reason — departing along with Hale was general manager Dave Stewart, and the Snakes have yet to fill their GM job. One would think the Diamondbacks would hire a GM first before hiring a manager. Involving a new GM in a managerial hiring process would help ensure that the GM and manager are a good match for one another — a GM and manager who don’t work well together can cause problems, as we’ve seen lately with Jeff Bridich and Walt Weiss in Colorado, and before that with Jerry Dipoto and Mike Scioscia in Los Angeles. Hiring a manager before hiring a GM could make the GM opening less attractive for highly qualified candidates, which is potentially a serious issue for the Diamondbacks, who might already have a hard time attracting such candidates given how short their last two GMs’ tenures have been.
Of course, it’s possible the Diamondbacks’ search for a GM (or a head of baseball operations) is further along than has previously been reported. Arizona has already been connected to Nationals exec Mike Rizzo (although the Nationals have denied Rizzo is a serious candidate), Royals assistant GM J.J. Picollo, former Dodgers GM Ned Colletti, MLB senior VP Kim Ng and a variety of candidates with ties to the Diamondbacks organization. Former Blue Jays and Dodgers exec Alex Anthopoulos and Rays VP of baseball operations Chaim Bloom have already indicated they’re not interested.
