One of the more undersung developments under general manager Alex Anthopoulos has been the complete reworking of the Braves’ scouting department. After firing longtime scouting director Brian Bridges who was very well liked, the front office has re-invented the Braves’ scouting operations under the watchful eye of Dana Brown who AA hired to replace Bridges.
The difference in draft strategy was already pretty stark given the Braves’ picks in the 2019 draft, but it is clear that one thing that Anthopoulos is privileging is familiarity and trust in his personnel decisions. While he has pillaged the Astros’ analytics department a bit, a good chunk of the advisors he has brought on were folks that he worked with when he was running the Blue Jays.
That trend continued today.
John Gibbons is back in baseball. Former Blue Jay Dana Brown has hired him as a national amateur scouting crosschecker with the Atlanta Braves.
— steve simmons (@simmonssteve) February 17, 2020
John Gibbons has been mentioned as a managerial candidate for several jobs since he left the Blue Jays for a second time back in 2018. As other reports have noted, AA always admired Gibbons’ evaluation abilities and it looks like he was wanting even more familiar, trusted faces in the scouting department.
Gibbons doesn’t have any specific scouting experience that is known, he did start out his career as a minor league catching instructor and coached in the minor leagues for the better part of a decade.