NEWSLETTER
With his promotion to the Assistant General Manager level, Jared Banner left his role as the Cubs’ VP of Player Development, also colloquially known as the Farm Director. It’s the job that sits atop all things farm system, and it’s one of the most important roles in a healthy organization.
The job how now been filled, as reported by Michael Schwab:
Jason Kanzler seems to have confirmed the news, himself, by updating his LinkedIn profile. Thus, the Cubs have a new director of player development.
(The title is not quite the same one that Banner had – Kanzler is a “director” as opposed to a “vice president” – but it’s a safe assumption that this hiring is to replace what Banner was doing in his capacity leading player development.)
Kanzler, 33, has spent the last five years in the Houston Astros organization, serving as a minor league hitting coach, a hitting coordinator, and then a coach on the big league staff. He also has experience as a player (in the Twins’ farm system), and running an independent performance center. It’s an interesting trajectory to move into a top player development job without coming over directly from a player development role, but it’s not as if being a hitting coach/coordinator doesn’t have significant overlap. I gather that Kanzler was seen as a rapidly rising coach, and the Cubs jumped.
Of note, the Cubs’ other Assistant GM, Ehsan Bokhari, came over from the Astros’ organization two years ago, so I’m also going to presume that there was familiarity there, and a hearty recommendation.
I hope we hear more from and about Kanzler soon. The role has been, in recent years, something of a springboard to moving on up the Cubs’ front office ladder. Banner, as noted, got the bump this offseason to the AGM role. Banner, himself, had replaced Matt Dorey after he was promoted to VP of Player Personnel, the role that had been vacated by Jason McLeod.
