Arizona Diamondbacks GM Kevin Towers: Conversations with Tony La Russa have been good
Jun 4, 2014, 8:25 PM | Updated: 8:25 pm
Arizona Diamondbacks GM Kevin Towers finally had some sit-down conversations with chief baseball officer Tony La Russa.
They’ve been in the team’s draft room the last couple of days going over film and reports ahead of the first-year player draft as well as had lunch a couple of times.
“Most of the conversations are more not about job description and responsibilities as much as baseball philosophy and putting together a ballclub and talking about players,” Towers told Doug and Wolf on Arizona Sports 98.7 FM Wednesday morning. “I think my job is the job that it’s always been, it’s just there will be much more interaction probably with Tony. When we’re doing things it will be discussed with Tony.”
But, Towers said, it seems to be case where he is the general manager and his job is still to do what the general manager does. He knows when a deal or any move is on the table he’ll discuss it with La Russa, but that’s not going to be an issue.
“It’s been good, the conversations have been good,” he said. “I’ve felt that all along — he’s a baseball guy and I consider myself a baseball guy, and when two baseball guys talk there’s a comfort level.”
It probably doesn’t hurt that the D-backs, whose struggles seemed to put the jobs of both Towers and manager Kirk Gibson in jeopardy, have been playing better baseball of late.
Though just 24-36 and 14 games back of the NL West-leading San Francisco Giants, they are 8-8 since La Russa was hired and significantly more competitive than they were earlier in the season when the team’s struggles were at their worst.
Whether or not that has led to improved job security for the fourth-year GM remains to be seen, but at the very least it appears any questions of what his role would be going forward have been answered.
