4 in front office fired as Jeter preps to take over
MIAMI — Derek Jeter’s impact is already being felt in a major way in the Miami Marlins’ front office.
The Marlins this week fired four vice presidents, sources told the Sun Sentinel: Mike Berger (VP/assistant general manager), Marc DelPiano (VP of player development), Jim Benedict (VP of pitching development) and Jeff McAvoy (VP of player personnel).
On the frontoffice page of the Marlins’ website, they are in the Nos. 2-5 spots in the baseball operations department, under Michael Hill, president of baseball operations.
The firings clear the way for Jeter to install his own people when he and the new ownership group, led by control person Bruce Sherman, officially take over from Jeffrey Loria. The $1.2 billion deal is expected to closed Monday, the day after the Marlins’ season ends. Jeter will have a CEO-type role.
Among the names most often mentioned within baseball, according to industry sources, are a pair of New York Yankees employees: Gary Denbo, their vice president of player development and a longtime friend of Jeter’s, and Jim Hendry, a special assistant and a former GM of the Chicago Cubs.
Not yet the boss, Jeter has let go of nine Marlins executives, including four special assistants and club president David Samson.
As was the case with last week’s quartet, Samson was the one to inform the others of their firings.
With little to no communication from Jeter himself, there is a feeling of unease throughout the Marlins’ front office, with many employees and departments — baseball operations and elsewhere — yet to have their futures addressed.
Berger was a two-time Loria hire, first in Montreal in the late 1990s and again November 2013 when he joined the Marlins as VP/AGM under Hill.
The Marlins hired McAvoy at the same time. He worked first as director of pro scouting before getting bumped up to VP/player personnel.
DelPiano, like Berger, was among those who had the unusual experience of being fired then rehired by Loria. He was on his second stint with the Marlins, the first coming in 2002-05, when he worked in minor league operations and international scouting. The Marlins brought him back as VP/player development to oversee the farm system two years ago this month.
Benedict came to the Marlins from the Pirates around the same time. Miami thought highly enough of him to send minor league pitcher Trevor Williams to Pittsburgh for the right to hire Benedict. Benedict’s fingerprints were all over last offseason’s moves in particular, from the signings of former Pirates Jeff Locke and Edinson Volquez to the hiring of Marlins bullpen coach Dean Treanor to the additions of several minor league pitching coaches with Benedict ties.
Odds & ends
Left-hander Wei-Yin Chen received a platelet-rich plasma injection into his left elbow, his third in the past year and a half, after visiting with Dr. Neal ElAttrache this week. Chen has missed about half of the past two seasons while nursing a partially torn UCL in his left elbow. … Right-hander Dan Straily made his career-high 33rd start of the year Friday, among baseball’s league leaders and the only Marlins pitcher to last in the rotation the entire season. “Dan’s been the model of consistency,” manager Don Mattingly said. “I’m sure he would look at the year and think it could’ve been better, but I think a guy who takes that ball every time, is healthy, there’s something to be said for that. That’s something he should be proud of.”