Atlanta Braves John Hart Speaks On The GM Position
By Jeff Schafer
A historical day in the Atlanta Braves organization happened on Monday…for the first time in a nearly a quarter century, the Braves fired a Manager or General Manager as Frank Wren was let go from his duties of GM.
At the press conference the Braves announced that John Schuerholz, Bobby Cox and John Hart will be a three man team as the Braves Interim GM until the find the right person for the position.
A day later, news broke that Hart has been offered the position IF he would like to take it. The ball is in his court now supposedly…
“We’ll certainly look internally,” said Hart when asked about who could potentially fill the position. “This organization would remise if it didn’t look at the broad universe of people out there. I go back to when John Schuerholz came over, he was in Kansas City, he was the right guy and came over with Bobby Cox who was in Toronto. Before I was with Cleveland, I was with the Orioles. At some point you don’t want to look over what you have, and we have a lot of talented guys here, but I think you’re also doing yourselves a disservice if you don’t see what’s out there in the greater baseball world.”
From that, I gather that the Braves will take some time to look at the potential GM candidates that are will to take the job, go through the interview process and if they don’t find someone they feel confident in, it will fall back on John Hart.
“I think the process of looking for a new leader…we are going to take our time, we are going to talk to a lot of people and I assume we will be transparent as we go through the process but not to much so that we don’t lose the right guy,” Hart went on to say.
During the press conference, the Braves said they would like someone in the position by the November GM winter meetings.
“I think number one, we are going to look at the broad universe of talent that’s out there in the game,” Hart said on GM prospects. “There are a lot of quality guys that have had this job before and one way of sort it hasn’t worked out. There are a lot of young guys that are very talented that are out there that potential could step in. It’s a chance to do a thorough evaluation of the entire organization – all the way from scouting, international scouting, development pipeline…the game is about the players and you need good players coming. It’s been something the Braves have done well for so many years.”
It will be interesting to see the direction the Braves go with the new GM. Hart has lots of experience as a GM…he was with the Cleveland Indians from 1992-2001 as the GM. He won six AL Central titles and two AL Championships (1995 & 1997). He was also with the Texas Rangers as the GM from 2002-2005 and Special Advisor from 2005-2013. He won two AL Championships with the Rangers as well (2010 & 2011).
“Overall the personnel, the group of talented, dedicated staffing is outstanding,” Hart said about the employees the Braves currently have. “I had the chance to sit through the draft process and had the chance to get down to almost all the minor league clubs this spring training and got to see the guys working. Any organization would like to have more players and better players and I think that’s really the trick. The good organizations whether it’s through your draft or through your international scouting, that makes it easier to function. It’s really the cache that the General Manager has…you can use them for your major league team or you can use them to make trades. We just have to upgrade the level of talent at the minor league level.”
The minor league teams have been an issue for years now for the Braves. It seems like they have quality guys coming through but the teams can never be a factor. Sounds like Hart wants to grow this organization starting from the minors…”The Braves Way”…and work that development up to the MLB.