At a time when face-to-face interviews and press conferences are but a distant memory, Dodgers President of Baseball Operations Andrew Friedman formally introduced 37-year-old Brandon Gomes as their new General Manager on Thursday morning … via Zoom.

“The way [Brandon] poured himself into our pitching department and the incredible strides that we’ve made on that front, his fingerprints are all over our player development system,” Friedman told reporters over the popular on-line service. “Our major league roster in the last few years has his fingerprints all over it.”

As Dodgers fans know, Friedman and Gomes worked closely together while with the Tampa Bay Rays organization. In fact, it was then Rays General Manager Andrew Friedman who selected the Fall River, MA native and fellow Tulane University Green Wave in the 17th round of the 2007 MLB draft.

“His ability to handle constructive criticism, and appreciate that it was only to make him better. Not only could he handle it, but he wanted it, and sought out that information from myself and others that I worked with the Rays,” said Friedman, who served as the Rays GM through 2014 before joining the Dodgers. “You could see it in terms of how it made him better on the field, and just his ability to connect with teammates.”

Dodger fans also know that Gomes has moved up the Dodgers administrative ladder at breakneck speed, especially for a guy who made his last Major League pitch a mere six seasons ago.

“I think I could argue that it could have been quicker,” Friedman said, when asked about Gomes’ quick ascension through the Dodgers front-office ranks. “I think just his ability to connect with people, and then what stems from that. You kind of get a sense through this, just how curious he was as a player, how curious he is now in this role, and his natural leadership qualities. You take all of that together, and I think it’s a pretty rare executive profile.”

“I love it here,” Gomes told reporters. “Getting the chance to put down roots and continuing to work with Andrew and the rest of the incredibly talented group is the absolute ideal situation, and I’m incredibly grateful for that.”

Friedman concluded the 23-minute-long Zoom presser with this glowing summary of his new General Manager:

“I would like to add one thing on Brandon that I think it’s fairly unique. After 2016, a Major League team called to interview him to be their Major League pitching coach. After 2018, a team called him to interview him to be assistant GM. In the last couple years, he’s got a lot of permission requests to be a GM. And there aren’t a lot of people that you can say that about that really are qualified to do so many different things. And I will say that at every turn, Brandon’s response was always the same, which is ‘No thanks, I want to be with the Dodgers. Incredible feels here and don’t want to leave. Family loves it here.‘ And so, it makes it even that much more special today, to reward it in this way. But I just wanted to touch on the uniqueness on that, because it actually struck me as we were doing this presser.”

Play Ball!

  *  *  *  *  *  *