Brewers: What Matt Arnold’s Promotion To GM Means Going Forward

The Milwaukee Brewers have made some minor changes to their front office, including promoting Matt Arnold to GM.

The Brewers have decided to shuffle things around a little bit.

They have announced a promotion for Assistant GM Matt Arnold, giving him the fancy new title of Senior Vice President of Baseball Operations and General Manager of the Brewers.

David Stearns, who had been the President of Baseball Operations and General Manager since prior to the 2019 season, now just holds the title of President of Baseball Operations.

In a statement, David Stearns said that this “formalizes how we have operated over the last few years. This move provides Matt with the deserved recognition of his tireless work and ensures that our baseball operations leadership group remains intact.”

What does all of this mean for the Brewers?

What this means is that the Brewers felt Matt Arnold was ready for a GM role. He’s interviewed with a number of teams over the last few years but has been passed up for the job. Arnold has put in the work necessary to be deserving of that role and if no one else would give it to him, the Brewers are happy to do so and keep him in their front office.

He’s had five years experience as an Assistant GM and was ready to make the leap. Now, if another team wants to interview Arnold for their front office, it would have to be for a President of Baseball Operations role, otherwise the Brewers can block anyone from interviewing him.

As Stearns also said, this move simply formalizes how they’ve operated over the last few years. In his opinion, this doesn’t really change much in the day-to-day operations of the club.

Essentially, both Stearns and Arnold operate together and make decisions as partners as to how they’re going to build their roster.

Stearns still technically has final say over the roster and is the highest ranking member of that front office staff, but they don’t appear to make too many moves where Stearns wants to do one thing and Arnold wants to do something different.

This keeps continuity in the front office leadership, which is good considering this front office has guided the franchise to three straight postseason appearances.

This also could help lighten the load on Stearns and Arnold. With Arnold moving up, that means he should be able to get an Assistant GM of his own that can take on some of the work that Stearns had Arnold do before. That could free them up to take some deeper dives into certain players and take a sharper focus on very important things.

What this comes down to is: Stearns still makes the final decisions, these two operate well together, the Brewers keep Arnold in their front office for continuity, and while the titles may change, the day-to-day operation won’t.

Arnold has been rewarded for his excellent work in the front office and the Brewers won’t suffer from a brain drain. This is good news all around for the organization.