Source: LA's Byrnes candidate for Angels GM

ANAHEIM -- Dodgers senior vice president of baseball operations Josh Byrnes has emerged as a candidate for the Angels' general manager vacancy, a source confirmed to MLB.com. The news was first reported Saturday by Ken Rosenthal of FOXSports.com, who added that the Angels could bring Byrnes in as GM or president of baseball operations.

The Angels, however, only plan on hiring someone for the title of GM, bucking a trend of teams -- most prominently the Dodgers and Red Sox -- adding a handful of prominent executives with various titles.

Byrnes joins Billy Eppler (Yankees assistant GM), Josh Atkins (Indians vice president of player personnel) and Tony LaCava (Blue Jays assistant GM) as known external candidates for the job vacated by Jerry Dipoto on July 1. Mike Hazen was also a candidate, until being promoted as Red Sox GM under new president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski.

The Angels have also interviewed three internal candidates in assistant GMs Matt Klentak and Scott Servais, and director of pro scouting Hal Morris.

Of their eight known candidates, Byrnes is the only one with prior experience as a GM, serving in the role with the D-backs (2005-10) and Padres (2011-14). Byrnes was dismissed on both occasions, being replaced by Dipoto -- on an interim basis -- in Arizona and by current first-year GM A.J. Preller in San Diego. Byrnes' teams posted a winning record in two of his eight seasons as GM.