Tigers owner Chris Ilitch promised a “thorough, exhaustive search” for the club's next general manager after dismissing Al Avila from the role on Wednesday.
“We will deploy the full resources of our organization to ensure we identify the best candidate to lead our baseball operations into the future,” Ilitch said. “I am going to tap into every resource at my disposal in this organization and the contacts that me and all of my colleagues have throughout the industry.”
One of Ilitch’s best resources might be A.J. Hinch. The Tigers manager has been involved in Major League Baseball since his playing career began in 1998. He’s managed three teams and served in executive roles for two. He has an array of contacts across baseball. Hinch said Wednesday that he’ll “participate in whatever Chris would like me to in order to make this organization better.”
(What Hinch won’t do is take over the GM job himself. He shot that idea down when he said, “No, I’m the manager.)
Hinch said Ilitch asked him Wednesday about lending a hand in the GM search, and Ilitch confirmed that Hinch will be involved, “along with several of our other senior baseball executives.”
Hinch, 48, is ready to step up.
“Obviously this organization has committed a ton to me and vice versa, and I want to help get it right,” Hinch said. “Today is another reminder that we haven’t succeeded. The record reflects where we’re at and we all feel responsible in this organization.
“I said it at the All-Star Break: we need to push the ball forward and move in that direction more aggressively. I didn’t anticipate a personnel change, but I do think there’s a lot of areas that we can address and we will address once we get our leader in charge.”
Ilitch said part of the reason he dismissed Avila now rather than after the season was “to get a jumpstart on the search process” for his replacement. He confirmed the Tigers will consider both internal and external candidates and look high and low for “the best candidate to help us achieve our objectives.”
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If Hinch were pitching a potential candidate on the job, he said he would emphasize that “the Detroit Tigers organization is a good place.”
“We have a ton of opportunity,” said Hinch. “This is the same place that was attractive a couple years ago when I came here and obviously the players, the fanbase, the commitment from ownership, the opportunity to build your own brand with a fresh start. Hopefully they’ll like the manager in place. There’s a lot to feature here, and to be a Detroit Tiger matters. It’s not just taking over a record from this season or last season.
“Whoever it is, unless it’s somebody internally, will come with no baggage from the last two years that I’ve been here or the five, six, seven years, however long it’s been. And that, to me, is a blank slate to create the opportunity that this city deserves.”
As for how long the search might take, Ilitch would only say that it’s “going to be thorough, it’s going to be wide, it’s going to be deep and I’m going to leave it wide open.”
“At the end of the day, it’s about getting the right person," he said. "I’m not going to put a timeline on it. It’s all about finding the right next leader for our baseball operations.”
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