Cincinnati Reds promote Nick Krall to GM, Dick Williams head of Baseball Operations

Jed Hoyer is the GM of the Chicago Cubs, not Theo Epstein. Farhan Zaidi is the GM of the Los Angeles Dodgers, not Andrew Friedman.

You knew that, right?

There has been a significant trend in Major League Baseball over the last few years of doling out different names and titles to the executives in charge in front offices, with the classic roles from a generation ago not exactly the same as they once were. On Thursday, the Cincinnati Reds became the latest MLB franchise to make that new delineation, as they announced the promotion of Nick Krall to the position of GM, with now-President of Baseball Operations Dick Williams doing the announcing himself.

In reality, the only real takeaway here is the endorsement of Krall, who earlier today was listed as ‘Vice President, Assistant General Manager’ on the team’s front office directory, with Williams still holding both the Baseball Ops title as well as ‘General Manager.’ Krall, as the team’s press release notes, has been with the Reds organization for 16 years, meaning this is yet another move to promote from within during this seemingly endless rebuild.

As The Athletic’s C. Trent Rosecrans pointed out, this can actually be viewed as somewhat of an endorsement of the current state of affairs, which is certainly interesting in the wake of the team’s awful start to 2018 and the early-season change of the team’s manager. In reality, though, he’s exactly right - and this likely won’t shake up much at all of what the team has already been up to daily during Williams’ tenure.

** UPDATE **

As Red Reporter’s Former Fearless Leader Joel Luckhaupt reminded us just a minute ago, he actually had a chance to interview Krall back in 2009 here on this very site. It’s a great read with some additional insight into Krall from back when he was the Assistant Director of Baseball Operations.