Phillies pick Sam Fuld as new general manager

Here’s a rather shocking development during a holiday week: The Phillies are promoting Sam Fuld to be their new general manager, the club announced Tuesday. Jim Salisbury of NBC Sports Philadelphia was the first to report on this.

Fuld will work under Dave Dombrowski, who was introduced as the president of baseball operations earlier this month.

In parts of eight major league seasons, Fuld, a left-handed hitting outfielder, slashed .227/.307/.325. Fuld joined the front office of the Phillies after the 2017 season, initially under the title of player information coordinator, but most recently as the director of Integrative Baseball Performance.

In many senses, Fuld’s job has been to work with the research and development department on crafting ways to help players make adjustments that the team’s internal analytics say will help them become better. Players may scoff at an Ivy Leaguer that they don’t believe has ever played the game trying to tell them to make an adjustment, but Fuld has the background of having played in the league. (He also went to Stanford, so he’s pretty damn smart.)

It was unclear if the Phillies would hire a new general manager to work under Dombrowski, who will be the point person on decisions. Promoting Fuld from within essentially allows him to serve as the No. 2 in the front office to Dombrowski.

Had the Phillies not made such a promotion, there was a very real chance that they’d lose the 39-year-old at some point in the next few years. Fuld had interviewed for the Toronto Blue Jays managerial gig as far back as October of 2018, after his first season in the Phillies organization. Fuld turned down the chance to interview for three managerial openings last winter, but seemingly was the runner-up to Alex Cora for the Boston Red Sox managerial vacancy this offseason.

You can read about more changes in the front office here.

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