SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Another day, another significant change in the Cubs’ hierarchy.
On Sunday, it was assistant general manager Scott Harris getting hired away by the Giants to become the general manager just a few miles down the road from his hometown of Redwood City, California.
Harris, 32, has been considered a rising-star executive in baseball for several years. A former business student at Columbia who completed his MBA at Northwestern, Harris has been in the Cubs’ front office since he was 25 — earning the nickname “Doogie Howser” at the time from one longtime Chicago baseball writer.
The hiring comes one year after the Giants restructured the top of their baseball operation and hired Farhan Zaidi as president of baseball operations over Cubs executive Jason McLeod and others.
It’s just one more big change for the Cubs, who have revamped their field staff, player-development operation and even their support staff between a disappointing 84-win finish and Monday’s start of the annual general managers meetings in Scottsdale.
Team president Theo Epstein’s pledge to build the Cubs’ next champion starts in earnest this week with the first wave of face-to-face meetings with player agents and teams with trade needs.
The Cubs, who are dealing from a position of little payroll flexibility, take an “open-minded” approach into trade talks and changes to the roster that could include big names.
The buzz surrounding the Cubs involves two-time All-Star catcher Willson Contreras, who already is drawing a lot of interest from teams hovering like vultures over the Cubs’ “no-untouchables” -roster.
The Cubs will need a big haul to move Contreras, who has three seasons of club control left.
Kris Bryant is expected to be in a lot of rumors this winter, but the free-agent market for third basemen is strong with Anthony Rendon, Josh Donaldson and Mike Moustakas all available without having to give up player capital.
If the Cubs decide to move Bryant — who has two years of control left, pending the result of last week’s service-time grievance hearing — they might find a better market near the summer trade deadline.
