Front-Office Shakeup For Indians

CLEVELAND—The Indians have a long history of developing front-office personnel that eventually moves on to other organizations, and it happened again at the end of 2016.

After the World Series, the Twins officially hired assistant general manager Derek Falvey as chief baseball officer and executive vice president. The loss of Falvey, who had been a member of the Indians organization for nine years, resulted in restructuring of general manager Mike Chernoff’s staff.

Cleveland promoted farm director Carter Hawkins and director of baseball operations Matt Forman to assistant GM roles.

Hawkins just completed his ninth season in the organization, while Forman is in his fourth year with the Indians.

“(Falvey) was an incredible friend to us, and there was tremendous value to the organization with what he did,” Chernoff said. “But it also creates more opportunities for people internally.”

In their roles as assistant GMs, Hawkins and Forman will continue to concentrate on their areas of expertise.

“They will split duties a little differently from what Derek did,” Chernoff said. “Derek’s primary focus was on the major league team, and assisting in all other aspects of baseball (operations). We’ll now split duties. Carter’s main focus will continue to be player development. Matt’s focus will continue to be in scouting. Both guys will collaborate with us as leaders in the organization in all the other aspects of baseball operations.”

This is the second consecutive year that the Indians have had to reconfigure their front office. Following the 2015 season, team president Mark Shapiro left to assume the same role with the Blue Jays. He took vice president of player personnel Ross Atkins with him.

That resulted in GM Chris Antonetti being promoted to president of baseball operations in Cleveland, with Chernoff moving up from assistant GM.

SMOKE SIGNALS

• The day after the World Series ended the Indians announced they had exercised the 2019 and 2020 club options for manager Terry Francona as well as the 2017 club option for first baseman Carlos Santana.

• Antonetti said righthander Mike Clevinger will go to spring training as a starter next year. He recorded a 5.26 ERA in 17 games (10 starts) with the Indians.