Baltimore Orioles Announce Several Promotions After Wild Start to Their Offseason

After a busy start to the offseason, the Baltimore Orioles have announced promotions within their organization that filled multiple spots.

Baltimore Orioles' general manager Mike Elias speaks at the Delmarva Shorebirds' annual hot stove banquet / Staff Photo by Richard Pollitt, Salisbury Daily Times via Imagn Content Services, LLC

General manager Mike Elias and skipper Brandon Hyde hinted there would be some changes for the Baltimore Orioles this offseason, and that certainly has been the case early on.

Before things officially kicked off, they already made adjustments to their offensive staff, advance scouting department, and head trainer.

Things didn't stop there, though.

The Orioles made a deal to acquire an outfielder and former top prospect of the Detroit Tigers, bolstering a unit that is expected to lose Anthony Santander in free agency.

It was also revealed that their director of pitching would not return in 2025 and two of their players elected to test the open market instead of accepting an outright assignment to the minors.

When it comes to their organizational openings, Baltimore has been able to fill some of these roles internally, announcing multiple promotions that were reported by Roch Kubatko of MASN.

-Mike Snyder was promoted to vice president of pro scouting
-Brendan Fournie was promoted to senior director of baseball strategy and operations
-Di Zou is promoted to senior director of baseball systems and analytics operations
-Ryan Hardin from senior data scientist of pro player evaluation to director of pro player analytics
-Michael Weis from senior data scientist of draft evaluation to director of draft analytics
-Jim Daniels from senior software engineer to assistant director of baseball systems
-Peter Ash from senior software engineer to principal software engineer
-Ben MacLean from pro scouting analyst to senior analyst in pro scouting
-Ben Reed from pro scouting analyst to senior analyst in pro scouting
-Sam Kim from MLB Fellow to pro scouting analyst

"I am proud to announce these promotions, which reflect the growth of our front office and the ascent of the organization as a whole ... I'd like to thank David Rubenstein and the entire ownership group for their commitment and investment toward continual improvement in baseball operations," Elias said as part of his statement.

The headliners are the promotions of Snyder, Fournie and Zou.

Snyder has been with the Orioles since 2009, moving up the baseball operations side of things while holding different roles and earning multiple promotions. The most recent job he held was the senior director of pro scouting.

According to Kubatko, "Snyder will continue to oversee their pro scouting and player analysis across the majors, minors and Asian professional leagues, and also assist with contract negotiations, 40-man roster construction, player transactions and departmental hiring" and that "he's one of the most important behind-the-scenes guys in the organization."

Fournie has been with Baltimore for three years.

He has experience working with Elias from their time with the Houston Astros, and now he'll play a greater role in baseball economic research and advance scouting, while also advising the baseball operations team on roster management, transactions and contracts.

Zou has been the director of baseball systems for the Orioles during the last three seasons after joining the organization eight years ago.

While maintaining his duties of overseeing development of internal baseball operations information systems, he will now also contribute to various initiatives related to baseball technology and analytics.

The promotions didn't stop there, though.

Kubatko also reported the shifts in the strength and performance department.

-Trey Wiedman goes from MLB strength coach to head MLB strength coach
-Rogelio Realzola goes from performance analyst to major league performance analyst
-Will Alli moves up from minor league strength and conditioning coordinator to director of minor league strength and conditioning
-Jon Medici moves up from Triple-A strength and conditioning to assistant minor league strength and conditioning coordinator
-Julio Diaz-Berrios goes from complex strength and conditioning coordinator to Latin America strength and conditioning coordinator