The Rays announced to reporters that they have hired Jon Daniels as senior adviser for baseball operations, via Chelsea Janes of the Washington Post. Daniels had spent many years with the Rangers until he was recently fired as president of baseball operations.
Daniels, 45, spent 17 years running the baseball operations in Texas, getting hired as general manager in 2005 and promoted to the POBO role in 2013. The Rangers had their best run of success with Daniels at the helm, as they made the playoffs in five out of seven seasons from 2010 to 2016, including trips to the World Series in the first two of those years. Since that time, however, the club has entered a rebuilding period that has continued to linger. They fell to 78-84 in 2017 and just endured their sixth straight losing season in 2022, with Daniels getting fired in August.
Despite the poor results in recent seasons, the Rays will bring Daniels into their front-office mix. Said front office is headed by Erik Neander, president of baseball operations, followed by Peter Bendix, senior vice president baseball operations and general manager. The exact level of involvement they expect from Daniels is unclear, but Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times relays that Daniels will focus on “supporting baseball ops senior leadership while utilizing his extensive experience in the industry to help further inform decision-making.”
In addition to the hiring of Daniels, the Rays also announced several promotions and/or title changes, with Topkin giving a rundown on Twitter.
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