The Dana Brown Hire: One Step Forward AND One Step Back

On Thursday midday, the Astros announced the hiring of Dana Brown as their new general manager. This seems good news, as Brown has a long track record in major league front offices, and has been notably successful in his 4 years as head of scouting with the Atlanta Braves in drafting good young players like Michael Harris and Spencer Strider.

This seems like a step forward.

That news broke at 12:47 Houston time. Four minutes later another bit of news broke, from Bob Nightengale of USA Today.

Bob Nightengale @BNightengale

The runner-up for the Houston #Astros GM job: Brad Ausmus

Ausmus of course was a long-time major league catcher who spent the majority of his career with the Astros. He has continued to work in baseball since retirement as a player, serving two stints as a manager (with the Tigers and then the Angels) and two in a front office position with the Padres and Angels. But in none of those front office positions did Ausmus serve in a top level position. He had never served as an Assistant General Manager or the Head of a Department. In short, he does not fit the regular qualifications to be a general manager.

This seems to be a step backward. A search that produced someone like Ausmus as a serious candidate is a worrisome sign that either the brass was not focused on the question of “who is the best GM we can hire” or answered that in an unusual way different from most teams in major league baseball.

And the step up/step back metaphor describes a lot of my thinking on the GM search and the hire of Dana Brown. There are clear positives and clear negatives and it is hard to see which is the more persuasive list.

I know what you came to this Substack for: fashion opinions. I’m not a fan of the color of Crane’s tie. Too light. A clear win here for Brown with the Orange and Blue big checked pattern.

Dana Brown is a Viable GM Candidate, but not Everyone on the Interview List Was

The Tigers were the only other MLB team to conduct a full-blown GM search this year. Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic reported that The Tigers interviewed Scott Harris, who got the job, Josh Byrnes, former GM of the Diamondbacks and Padres; Matt Slater of the Cardinals; Jason McLeod, who is a special assistant with the D-Back, and Dana Brown, who you are familiar with by now.

This is a list of viable GM candidates—one who was hired for that job, one who was hired for the next opening, and three who are potential candidates for future GM openings. The step forward is the Astros hired one of the candidates from this list. That is, someone who is regarded as one of the best potential GMs in baseball.

The Astros interviewed Brown, and are publicly reported to have considered Michael Hill, former longtime Marlins executive; Bobby Evans, former Giants GM; James Harris, assistant GM with the Guardians, and Brad Ausmus.

You will notice that besides Brown, none of the Astros candidates were on the list for the Tigers job. It’s pretty clear that the top question that the Tigers were asking in creating their list of candidates makes one wonder what questions Jim Crane and his advisers asked in trying to find their new GM.

A List With Few Viable Runners-Up, But One Surprisingly Good One

The list of candidates that the Astros interviewed is not very inspiring. As discussed, Ausmus lacks the conventional qualifications of a modern day GM. Evans was fired from the GM job in San Francisco, and, as best I can tell, has not interviewed for a GM job since he interviewed with the Astros in 2020. Michael Hill seems someone who is admired more as a man than respected as a baseball decision-maker. In this group, Brown was clearly the best option. But it’s not a high bar to get over.

Yet, there was one candidate the Astros interviewed who is very different than the other four—James Harris who is an Assistant GM with the Guardians. Harris is young—he is the only candidate under the age of 50—and has a reputation as an innovative thinker in baseball (and football as well; he was once in the Philadelphia Eagles front office). In this, he looks like the two previous GMs that Jim Crane hired. That Brown beat out a candidate like this says good things about Brown’s qualities as a GM.

Maybe an Autonomous GM. Definitely an Involved Owner

That Brown interviewed for the Tigers job indicates he was strongly regarded across baseball and that he might have gotten another GM job in the near future. In short, he did not have to take this job.

One of my concerns when Crane let James Click go after winning a World Series is that he had devalued the job that we would not be able to find a strong GM and would settle for someone below the par for a GM job. The hiring of Brown has relieved those fears.

But it is still unclear how autonomous Brown will be as a GM. Crane took over baseball operations between Click’s departure and Brown’s hiring, heading up the Astros offseason efforts. But Crane’s decisions over baseball operations did not start in November.

In fact, that’s not new. After the World Serie win, Jeff Passan of ESPN reported that Crane had vetoed a trade that Click worked out the Chicago Cubs to acquire Willson Contreras for Jose Urquidy. It is exceedingly unusual for owners to block trades that involve such small increases in payroll

Crane and His Assistant GMs Will Have Influence, But Their Decision Making This Off Season Was Solid

Crane also promoted two members of the Astros front office to the title of Assistant General Managers. These positions were open because one Assistant GM (Pete Putila) left in what is basically a lateral move and Crane fired Assistant GM Scott Powers, who Click had hired in January 2022. No reason was given for the firing and no public reporting has provided the reason for the firing.

Crane could have, and should have, let his new GM pick the assistants he wanted. That Crane made his own choices indicates that Brown’s autonomy as GM is limited at the beginning of his tenure. It is of course possible that this will change, but until it does, we can conclude that Crane has big influence on baseball operations.

But Crane’s influence on baseball operations has not been as deleterious as most owners who make their own baseball moves. Crane took over the Baseball Operations Department this offseason and did an okay job. He, aided by his Assistant GMs, let Justin Verlander go for a massive contract, but added Jose Abreu to occupy the hole in the lineup created by Yuli Gurriel’s aging. And they re-signed Michael Brantley, who seems less flawed than their other left field options. And they also re-signed Rafael Montero, which was not a needed move, but provides extra reinforcement in the bullpen.

They may regret the Montero and Abreu signings in their third years, but neither’s contract is so onerous that they can’t get around that in 2025 if needed. And in an offseason in which free agents got 11 year contract, three years for those guys where the price of doing business for a team with its eyes set on winning again in 2023.

Most importantly in my eyes, they seem ready to give the utility infielder job to David Hensley, rather that do the sentimental move of signing Gurriel. Those not steeped in baseball operations departments often focus names over skills and projections. That the Crane led baseball operations department seems to have avoided this temptation seems encouraging. The Astros success since 2015 has come from internal development and promoting their own prospects. Hensley fits squarely in that model.

The Brown Hire Indicates a Focus on Scouting, but Click Was Doing That Already

Dana Brown has focused almost exclusively on scouting in his front office career that includes time with the Expos/Nationals, the Blue Jays, and the Braves. While Crane talked up a wide variety of Brown’s skills, but his background is in scouting players.

Chandler Rome @Chandler_Rome

Jim Crane calls Dana Brown "very analytics savvy, a great talent evaluator, seasoned in player acquisitions, development and retention."

That is something of a shift from Jeff Luhnow’s front office which focused heavily on player development, and which used new technologies to try to replace some of the work that scouts had previously done. Overall, the focus on player development worked and the tech innovations had a more mixed record on providing the Astros edges over their opponents. Some of the reason those effects were muted is that other teams (and many individual players) quickly adopted technologies like high speed cameras and wearable technology.

And that was part of the reason why James Click had increased the front office’s focus on scouting, hiring more scouts than in the last year’s of Luhnow’s term as GM. There is almost no chance the number of scouts goes down and a near certainty that it goes up with Brown in charge.

Brown is a Better Fit, but Why is Fit a Priority Over Winning?

The press release that the Astros sent out announcing Brown’s hire included a quote from Crane stating that Brown was the “right fit.” Fit is one of the fuzzy words that has real meaning in hiring decisions. Or at least it does when my department hires new professors.

And one reason for the distinct list of GM candidates may be that fit was a priority. And one can see the personal connections between the two listed finalists and the Astros. Ausmus was of course the longtime teammate and friend of Community Outreach Executive Jeff Bagwell and Special Assistant to the General Manager Craig Biggio. And Brown has known Biggio for a long time—they were teammates in college at Seton Hall.

But it is odd that the Astros brass emphasized fit when the team just won the World Series. Whatever issues there were with the “fit” of any previous member of the front office, it was not enough to keep the team from the ultimate goal. Fit seems an odd priority.

The Other Power Center: The Old Guys

This is a long list of plusses and minuses about this GM search and the eventual hire. There are concerns that are important, but each is paired with an important point of reassurance.

There is one issue with the search that is hard to find a counterpoint to—the influence of Jeff Bagwell and Reggie Jackson. During the press conference yesterday, Brown noted that he had talked to Bagwell and Jackson as part of the interview process.

Chandler Rome @Chandler_Rome

Dana Brown said he spoke to Reggie Jackson and Jeff Bagwell during the interview process, but no one from the existing Astros front office or scouting department. Brown said he looks forward to getting to know them.

This confirms what has been clear all offseason—Bagwell and Jackson have influence with Crane. How much? It is hard to say, but their roles are unusual. Teams often hire former players to be special assistants or community outreach ambassadors, and the job often involves showing up at events and making people feel good about the old days. Sometimes they will offer small bits of advise on player acquisitions or points of emphasis.

Bagwell and Jackson’s influence is clearly much larger than that. Again, it’s hard to say how much, but it is clear these two have some power within the organization. Neither has ever worked in a baseball operations capacity. Their qualifications are that they were good players.

While those of us who follow modern front offices are puzzled that having played well a generation ago means someone knows about the modern game of Statcast data, avoiding CBT thresholds, and pitch design, Jim Crane think their perspective is important.

James Click seems to be out of a job because he failed at the glad handling part of the job. Many things have leaked about the issues between Crane and Click—some contradictory and some that seem small beer. But the theme seems to be a personal discomfort of Crane by Click.

It is unclear what effect this friction has had on the operation of the front office. But whatever effects it had, it couldn’t have been too fatal. The team did win the World Series just over two months ago.

But managing these personal relationship are obviously a very important part of the expectations for the Astros general manager. Based on the fact that the GM who won the World Series is no longer here, we can confidently say it is more important than winning baseball games.

So Brown needs to put time and effort into managing his relationship with Crane and with those who have Crane’s ear such as Bagwell and Jackson.

Brown at his press conference yesterday

Are The Astros Better Off Than They Were on November 6?

It is clear that the Astros are better off today—January 27—than they were on say January 24. Their baseball operations department is being run by a person whose expertise is in baseball, and not air freight logistics. And considering that a few days ago, news broke that Ausmus was a candidate for the job, they are better off today than considering a reality of having a GM who no other team would think to hire.

The need to search for a new GM and the reports of interviews with candidates who did not seem viable for the job raised some worst case scenarios for Astros fans. The hiring of Brown means those fears were not realized.

But there is an alternative path that Crane could have chosen on November 6, the day Framber dealt and Yordan sent one over the batters eye. Most owners would have chosen it and I believe I would have chosen it if I were making the hiring decisions for the Astros front office: keep James Click as your GM. Give him an extension commensurate with his value as a successful general manager.

Crane did not choose that path. The reasons for this remain opaque, but in many ways, the reasons don’t matter anymore. The Astros are on the Dana Brown path now and there is no turning back.

Did the Astros improve by replacing Click with Brown? The case for Brown over Click is that the team will function better if there is less friction between the owner and the general manager.

The model of the Brown tenure is likely to feature more people having influence over major roster decisions. It’s a far distance away from the model of the Jeff Luhnow era, when the front office was focuses nearly entirely on Luhnow.

Brown will instead be a spoke on the wheel of Astros decision making. Brown’s spoke will undoubtedly be important, but he will have to work together with Crane, who wants more influence, Bagwell and Jackson, who have Crane’s ear, and the Assistant GMs that Crane hired.

Can Brown pull that off? His resume is evidence that he can. One step forward.

But the fact that Brown will have to pull off such a feat means his job will be more difficult than most of his colleagues who run baseball operations departments. One step back.