ANAHEIM - The Angels kept reshaping their baseball operations on Monday, promoting Michael Lord and Matt Swanson to assistant general managers as the club continues a busy stretch of front office turnover under interim general manager John Mozeliak.
The two moves give the Angels four assistant general managers, with Lord and Swanson joining Joey Prebynski and David Haynes. The promotions came ahead of the Angels’ series opener against the Yankees.
Mozeliak said the changes are part of a broader effort to bring the organization’s decision-making into closer alignment.
“Part of the reason for all of this is to really get an alignment of how we think about our player acquisition,” Mozeliak said.
The front office reshuffle also included several departures. The Angels fired five area scouts and two crosscheckers, and they did not renew the contract of special assistant Ray Montgomery.
Swanson, who has spent the last 10 years with the Angels, will oversee professional scouting. He also previously worked under Mozeliak with the Cardinals. Mozeliak said Swanson’s new role is designed to create a more connected chain of command across the organization’s player acquisition work.
“We promoted Matt Swanson to be the assistant GM and oversee all player acquisitions,” Mozeliak said. “I really wanted a more vertical approach on how we think about player acquisitions.
Ultimately, he'll have the international department reporting to him from a player acquisition standpoint, pro department, as well as the amateur side. Really, it was just sort of an organization of communication.”
Lord has been with the Angels for the last six seasons as director of research and development. Mozeliak pointed to that promotion as a signal about how the club wants to operate going forward.
“The importance of that is really the understanding that how we're going to be making decisions and what we're anchoring to,” Mozeliak said. Elevating someone that's overseeing our R&D department to this level, I think, screams that it is important. We need to be using these resources, and I want that to be seen across all the baseball operations.”
Mozeliak said he has not done a deep dive yet into how the Angels’ research and development department compares with the rest of the league, but he acknowledged the group is small in terms of head count. Whether the Angels add more people there remains to be seen.
For now, Mozeliak said he is still looking for ways to strengthen the organization’s infrastructure.
“We have to get a stronger player development system. We have to have a strong player acquisition system.”
As for the search for a permanent general manager, Mozeliak said that process has not moved forward yet because the focus has stayed on internal improvements. He also said he has not yet thought about his own future.
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