Jerry Crasnick of ESPN reports that the Kansas City Royals have denied the Atlanta Braves request to interview Dayton Moore.
The Braves front office is in turmoil, with general manager John Coppollela being dismissed amid a Major League Baseball investigation of scouting and free agent signing infractions in Latin America. Moore was immediately named -- by fans and media, mostly -- as someone the Braves may target given that he worked for the Braves for 12 years, rising out from a scouting job to assistant general manager. Moore has not commented at all on the Braves opening, saying publicly that he is committed oto the Royals.
Moore signed an contract extension with the Royals in February 2016, and any team interested in hiring him would have to get permission from the Royals before interviewing him. It would be unusual for a team to grant permission for an executive under contract to interview with another team if it was merely a lateral move. Crasnick, however, says that the Braves wanted to interview Moore for a job “running their baseball operation,” which suggests that it’d be a promotion, as the Braves have at least one guy -- president of baseball operations John Hart -- as well as senior advisors such as John Scheurholtz who have had veto power over the GM’s decisions. It’s common in baseball for teams to grant permission for moves up the ladder.
Of course, there could be some nuance to all of this, extending from baseball’s recent trend of giving loftier and loftier titles to the men atop the baseball operations pyramid. The Royals do not have anyone above Moore as the GM, so perhaps, titles aside, they view the Braves opening as a lateral move. Hard to say.
Either way: looks like Moore isn’t going anyplace.
