Among Tigers' moves, Littlefield shifted to VP
KANSAS CITY -- New Tigers general manager Al Avila will be keeping nearly all of the assistants who worked under his predecessor, Dave Dombrowski. The team's second round of administrative moves, announced Tuesday, saw Avila change titles for some veteran advisors while promoting former Pirates general manager Dave Littlefield to vice president of player development.
Scott Reid, the longtime pro scouting head under Dombrowski, will stay on as a senior advisor to Avila. Dick Egan, a special assistant under Dombrowski, will stay on in the same role for Avila.
Also staying on are amateur scouting director Scott Pleis, Minor League operations director Dan Lunetta, international operations director Tom Moore, Latin American scouting director Miguel Garcia and player development director Dave Owen. In Owen's case, he'll report to Littlefield, who will take charge of the farm system.
Long story short, just about everyone in the Tigers' decision-making circle is staying in some role or another.
"We've identified the key personnel that we believe gives us the best complement of experience," Avila said in a statement. "These gentlemen have a high level of expertise that is invaluable in today's game of evaluating players."
The Tigers hired Littlefield last fall as a Major League scout after he spent seven seasons scouting with the Cubs. Littlefield was a former assistant for Dombrowski with the Florida Marlins, working alongside Avila, before heading to Pittsburgh. Avila briefly joined him there, before joining Dombrowski in Detroit in 2002.
Reid came to Detroit with Dombrowski after working for him with the Marlins. He served as vice president of player personnel for over a decade, running the pro scouting department, before Scott Bream shouldered most of the day-to-day administrative duties. Bream was named vice president of player personnel last week.
Egan, too, has a long history with Dombrowski, having followed him to Detroit after a decade with the Marlins' scouting department. A veteran of 55 seasons in pro ball, he served the Tigers as a pro scout before taking on the special assistant title in 2007.