Brewers hire Rays Director of Personnel Matt Arnold for Asst. GM position

Rays Director of Player Personnel Matt Arnold has been snatched away by the Brewers, who are promoting him to Assistant GM and giving him a VP title under new youngest-in-baseball GM David Stearns.

Arnold was involved in Milwaukee's interview process early on in their search for a new GM before the Marlins and Braves began interviewing Arnold for their own front office openings. In the end, Arnold chose the more forward thinking franchise among the three National League teams.

Speculation around Arnold, as well as the Rays two top VP's Chaim Bloom and Erik Neander, who share GM responsibilities under President Matt Silverman, led us to wonder if the Rays were at risk for a brain drain in the front office. This is not the reality we wanted to live in, but we wish all the best to Matt, an old friend of the site.

Arnold is the third high ranking front office member to leave the Rays in the last year, following former Astros GM Gerry Hunsicker and longtime Rays GM Andrew Friedman, both of whom were with the franchise from 2005-2014.

From the Associated Press:

"Matt is going to be the sole assistant general manager. We're really going to run the baseball operations group as a partnership," said Stearns, who is in his second full week on the job.

To learn more about Matt Arnold and just who the Rays lost, re-visit this great interview with Tommy Rancel back in 2009.