Atlanta Braves President of Baseball Operations/General Manager Alex Anthopoulos figures to have a very busy offseason on his hands. On top of having to figure out a way to fix a team that has clearly hit a bit of a blip over the past couple of seasons, he will now have to figure out a way to replace one of the most successful managers in franchise history in the form of Brian Snitker. During a press conference on Saturday morning, AA took plenty of questions about both the handling of Snitker’s transition to an advisory role and also the process of potentially finding a capable replacement.
Naturally, one of the first questions was whether or not the Braves were going to make it public knowledge as to who they’d be going after for their managerial opening. AA was truly in his “GM-Speak” bag during this press conference as he certainly kept his cards close to the vest. “If we do our job the way we want to do it, [the media] won’t have anything,” stated Anthopoulos. “Before Skip Schumaker was named [as the Rangers manager] last night, there were eight openings. I remember some other years where there were a bunch of manager openings but I can’t remember there being this many. That’s a lot of openings, a lot of turnover, a lot of places where you have to get permission to speak to other coaches. That makes it incredibly challenging.”
AA also commented on the early speculation that’s already happened and, again, he chose to throw a bit of cold water onto that by saying that they’re still operating on a blank slate. “I’ve already read and seen all candidate names and people that we’re going to talk to and all this kind of stuff. Not to be disrespectful but it’s all wrong. It’s no one’s fault, no one’s saying that they have this as a source. We do not currently have a list,” asserted Anthopoulos. He did mention that the search is apparently about tog et underway at any moment now. “As I sit here today, I might get off of this call in five minutes and have a candidate within 20 minutes and a list within a day,” said AA. “My focus [right now] is that I wanted to get some things done internally. We have expiring contracts…your manager’s not coming back, that creates a lot of uncertainty for staff.”
He continued to expound upon the current status of the managerial search and also how he’s treating things when it comes to the entire state of the ballclub right now. “My goal was really a race to get to Friday to communicate with people internally. That was my sole focus. Not a minute spent on managers or any of that kind of stuff because it’s not fair to the people who are currently Atlanta Braves employees who need to know what’s going on and need to be communicated with,” said AA. “I wanted to at least get my thoughts together and communicate with them by the end of day last night. Once this ends, I will turn my attention to the manager, to creating a list, to having candidates. We have not spoken to anybody, we have not reached out to anybody. We don’t have any current list. That is a fact.”
The next obvious question had to do with whether or not he’d prefer to stick with an organizational hire or someone who’s currently within the Bobby Cox coaching tree. Again, AA was a bit cagey with his response. “With Bobby and Snit, obviously the success is great. That speaks for itself. They’re their own individuals. As much as Bobby and Snit had a relationship, they’re different individuals.” Anthopoulos continued to discuss things while trying his best to not let anything slip inr egards to his future plans. “I’m not trying to give a generic answer but you’re looking for the best candidate,” said AA. “At the end of the day, I’d love to be able to have [someone reach] even close to the success that both of those guys have had…You just can’t rush it or force it. It’s a big decision, it’s a big hire. You’d love to do it sooner rather or than later but every team that’s gone through this would say the same thing.
One of the very first questions that Alex Anthopoulos fielded was concerning Brian Snitker and the speculation as to whether or not the organization forced Snit’s hand or if this was actually his choice. In that scenario, AA actually wanted to be clear. “He would’ve been back. That’s why we were going to wait and give him the time that he needed,” stated AA, plainly. “When he contacted me on Tuesday morning and said that he wanted to meet, we met and he just told me basically what he told you guys.” ‘I think three years is a good amount of time. I’ll be 70 at that time and [looking forward to] what happens next.“ At that point, that was when they began to explore what Snitker’s role as an advisor would look like and they didn’t have to make a huge jump to explore those possibilities. ”We talked about what Bobby [Cox] did,“ stated AA as he continued to make it very clear that this was Snitker’s decision. ”Would you want to manage three more years and then do what Bobby did? You’re a Brave for life, what do you want to do?”
Eventually, AA stated that the two parties agreed to a long-term deal of sorts — three years as manager and then five years after that as in an advisory role. Essentially, Brian Snitker is apparently locked in to be with the organization until he’s about to turn 75-years-old. “What happened with Bobby was a similar thing. They talked about this much earlier. We all know how Snit feels about Bobby. We’re not saying that he’ll end up in the Baseball Hall of Fame (certainly the Braves Hall of Fame, of course) but it’s a very similar career path for this organization. He’s earned it.”
AA proceeded to detail how the two parties would work together going forward. “We put an agreement in place. Contractual terms, years, dollars, all that kind of stuff. It was an eight-year working relationship contractually with the Braves…That was his news to break, that’s not my thing. It’s a private thing.” AA went on to say that they would’ve adjusted had Snitker felt differently about seeing out the entire three years but ultimately, it appears that AA had enough respect for Snitker to let the ball be in his court as to what he wanted to do going forward.
So while we didn’t get a lot of concrete information on the future when it comes to who Brian Snitker’s replacement will be, we did get a somewhat clearer picture as to how the Braves and Snit came to their agreement on the soon-to-be 70-year-old’s future with the organization.
