While other teams are hanging on to World Series dreams, the Tigers are beginning to retool for next season. The last couple days have already seen a little action, but more on the front office side of things.
The Tigers today named Kevin Hooker as the Pacific Rim coordinator. Hooker comes from the Phillies where he had responsibility for Australia the last 6 years and Taiwan, Korea and Japan for the last two.
They also cut ties with Victor Trasoff-Jilg who was the minor league medical coordinator. That appears to be the only minor league staff move though as all the managers and coaches were invited to return. In the same article Jon Paul Morosi notes that the Tigers will interview 4 candidates for the pitching coach position this week. No names were revealed.
Finally, it looks like Al Avila will be back as assistant GM. The Mariners asked permission to interview Avila for their GM vacancy, and were denied. It wouldn’t surprise me if Dombrowski held the GM reigns for only another year or two before handing that job to Avila. Of course after this past season, his grip on the position probably isn’t as solid as it once was.
I had a similar thought about the GM job being in Avila’s lap in a couple years. Of course, Dombrowski could just be protecting him from the frustration of having to work for Lincoln and Armstrong.
“Mark Anderson of Tigstown.com was on hand to take in some of the Instructional League action and filed daily reports. It’s premium content, but today he looked at the catchers and first baseman and the report on Alex Avila was glowing.”
I’m worried thoug that between assistant GM duties and Catching Avila may be getting spread too thin…
Coleman – Dusty Ryan has Avila blocked at C, so there’s really nowhere to go but Assistant GM. They were also looking at Larish, but decided the ill-fitting batting helmet didn’t project the professional look befitting a front office guy.
Can it possibly true the Tigers hired this Hooker dude who’s used to working down under (Australia) to handle the Pacific Rim?
I’ll be giggling for a good fifteen minutes!
I’m sure they wouldn’t be the first sports team with a Hooker on the payroll…
Smoking Loon: ‘Coleman – Dusty Ryan has Avila blocked at C, so there’s really nowhere to go but Assistant GM”
Go watch the Sheffield vs Folger Cremora brawl video again, and watch for Larish and Ryan. I think Dusty lost his lock on the job due to the intangibles of said performance. And they want to redo the rookie day thing and make him wear the Peter Pan outfit this time.
Inge on the other hand not only took down Martinez hard, but even got him so mad that Polanco was ejected.
(Larish looked to be in duck-n-cover mode, but it may be he was just trying to keep the ill-fitting hat on his head)