Port Hires an Experienced Assistant : Dan O’Brien Has 35 Years of Administrative Know-How

Angel Vice President Mike Port hired an assistant Friday afternoon, but he didn’t hire anyone who had previously served as an Angel designated hitter, homered in the World Series, won a league MVP award or written a book.

Dan O’Brien is no Don Baylor. Dan O’Brien is no Reggie Jackson. Dan O’Brien, in fact, never played an inning in the major leagues, his career as a professional baseball player beginning and ending with a tryout with the Brooklyn Dodgers.

But Dan O’Brien has 35 years’ worth of administrative experience, which is the main reason he today holds the title of senior vice president in charge of baseball operations for the Angels.

Concluding a search that began last December when owner Gene Autry promoted Port from general manager to chief operating officer with instructions to expand the front office, O’Brien, 59, joins the Angels after serving as general manager of the Texas Rangers, president of the Seattle Mariners and assistant to the president of the Cleveland Indians.

“As you know, we have given a considerable amount of thought to expanding the base of our baseball operations,” Port said, “and it was certainly important to all of us to locate and identify the proper and right individual.

“The position we were looking to fill calls for a well-experienced and senior baseball executive. Dan certainly fits that description.”

And that, apparently, ruled out Baylor and Jackson, the former Angel sluggers whose names repeatedly cropped up while Port conducted his search. Neither Baylor nor Jackson has any baseball administrative experience.

However, Baylor and Jackson remain candidates for another vacancy created by the Angels’ front-office expansion--a sort of “junior executive” who would, as Port put it, “go through things with Dan and learn through observation.”

Port refers to such a position as “our social and affirmative-action obligation.”

“With Dan O’Brien and his experience,” Port said, “we now have a situation where I can say, ‘Dan, I’ll be back in three days. Take over.’

“(The other position) would entail more participatory legwork. . . . It would involve player development and scouting and general major league operations.”

O’Brien’s assignment will be similar to the one Port held during Buzzie Bavasi’s tenure as Angel general manager, with Port overseeing the club’s scouting department and negotiating player contracts and Bavasi making trades and personnel decisions.

“Structurally, what we’re getting back to is how things were done when Buzzie Bavasi was here,” Port said. “That system paid off in a pair of division titles (1979 and 1982).

“The best approximation (of the Port-O’Brien relationship) is that Dan will do many of the same things that Mike Port did when Buzzie Bavasi was here.”

And that is?

“I handled a lot of contract matters under Buzzie,” Port said. “There was a lot of paper work--record-keeping, waivers, rules, assignments, spring training planning, clubhouse matters.

“Those are all things Dan has done.”

O’Brien began his career in management in 1955 when Branch Rickey hired him as general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Burlington, N.C., farm team. He also served in a similar capacity with three Milwaukee Braves minor league teams.

After that, O’Brien spent nine years as assistant to the president of the National Assn. of Professional Baseball Leagues before serving as vice president and general manager of the Texas Rangers from 1973 to ’79.

Then came stints as president of the Seattle Mariners (1979-1984) and assistant to the president of the Cleveland Indians (1984-1989).

O’Brien was hired in Cleveland by Peter Bavasi but had his responsibilities reduced when Hank Peters replaced Bavasi as the Indians’ president.

“My involvement in Cleveland was not as broad as it is here,” O’Brien said. “Hank brought in some of his own people, and that narrowed my involvement at that time. (The last fews years) I mostly oversaw player development.”

O’Brien considers his expertise to be the “the player evaluation side of it, the contract negotiation area,” and Port said O’Brien will assume a major portion of that role during the off-season. Last winter, after catcher Bob Boone’s defection to Kansas City, there were charges of Port spreading himself too thin in that department.

“(The hiring of O’Brien) goes along with the increasing responsibilities that go with trying to run a winning ballclub,” Port said. “As they say, two heads are better than one.”