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The three-headed transition committee of Bobby Cox, John Schuerholz, and John Hart have identified their first choice to replace Frank Wren as the new GM of the Atlanta Braves and it is (wait for it): John Hart. Jeff Passan of Yahoo! Sports is reporting that the Hart has been given the opportunity to take the "interim" tag off of his current position of GM of the Braves, and he's mulling it over. From the article:
Braves president John Schuerholz offered Hart the option of taking over the team's GM duties full-time, sources told Yahoo Sports. Before making a decision, Hart told Schuerholz he needed to give it serious thought, sources said.
Hart certainly isn't lacking in experience. He was the mind behind those successful Cleveland Indians teams from the '90s, but he didn't come close to reaching that level of success when he was the GM of the Texas Rangers in the early '00s. So it's pretty easy to say that he isn't the most popular figure in Texas, and that is the type of thing that would give most fans a bit of trepidation when it comes to trusting Hart with the construction of a team in 2015 and beyond.
However, for those of you who are still holding out hope that John Coppolella is given the promotion to the GM position, there was this nugget in the story:
Were Hart to accept the job, it's likely he would groom assistant GM John Coppolella, 35, whom the Braves retained. It's conceivable Coppolella could be elevated to the job now, too, though Atlanta could widen its search were Hart to turn it down.
Plus, Passan later goes on to mention that Hart was in a similar situation back in 2005 when he stepped down as GM and allowed Jon Daniels to take over. While Hart mulls over whether or not he will take the job, this is also a very distinct possibility; One that a lot of people (myself included) are hoping is the path that is taken here.
But, I think there's one thing that we all can agree on: At least it's not Dayton Moore. Coppy please, Hart maybe, but GMDM no. Please, no. But I digress, the point is that the search for the new Braves GM may indeed be a quick one and one that is done completely in-house, which I'm sure totally falls in line with The Braves Way™.