Villa promoted to Orioles director of player development

Part of the ripple effect from the Orioles’ wave of promotions today within the scouting department is a change in roles for Anthony Villa.

Villa is replacing Matt Blood as director of player development, according to an industry source. Blood has been promoted to vice president of player development and domestic scouting.

Villa was put in charge this year of overseeing the entire system as minor league hitting coordinator after working at the lower levels. He played in the White Sox system from 2016-18 and came to the organization prior to 2020 as hitting coach at Aberdeen before the pandemic forced the cancellation of the minor league season.

Among the announced promotions is the following:

Koby Perez is vice president of international scouting and operations. Mike Snyder is senior director of pro scouting. Gerardo Cabrera is director of Latin American scouting. Kevin Carter is manager of pro scouting. Hendrik Herz is manager of domestic scouting analysis. Chad Tatum is manager of domestic scouting. Will Robertson is special assignment scout. Alex Tarandek is a senior analyst in scouting. Michael Weis is a senior data scientist of draft evaluation. And Maria Arellano is senior manager of international operations and baseball administration.

More movement on the player development side is expected later in the offseason.

“We are very proud to announce this wave of promotions for a group of exceptionally talented and hard-working people,” executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias said in a statement. “Each has played a vital role in the recent success of the franchise, including the numerous accolades for our top-ranked farm system, the expansion of our international scouting presence, and of course bringing the AL East championship back to Baltimore with a historic 101-win season. I would like to congratulate each of these individuals on their well-deserved promotions and thank John Angelos and the entire partnership group for their steadfast support and investment in Orioles baseball.”

Blood will be responsible for overseeing the Orioles’ player development and domestic scouting operations, including staff recruitment and development, implementation of player development strategies and programs throughout the entire minor league system and first-year player draft operations. He will continue to report to Elias.

The Orioles hired Blood as director of player development in September 2019, and the Orioles’ farm system has risen to No. 1 in multiple rankings, including Baseball America, MLB Pipeline and ESPN.

Blood served as the Rangers’ director of player development in 2019, and he previously worked for the Cardinals as an area scout from 2009-15. He was team director for USA Baseball’s 18U National Team from 2016-18.

Also per today's press release, Perez will continue to oversee all aspects of the Orioles’ international scouting operations and management of the club’s bonus pool, and will also assume supervision of operations at the Orioles’ training academy in the Dominican Republic while serving as the organization’s primary executive contact for all levels of Latin American player personnel business. Perez also will continue to report to Elias.

The Orioles say Weis will expand his influence “in what has been a key role in providing analytics support to the Orioles’ draft process and amateur player evaluations.” He still reports to vice president and assistant general manager Sig Mejdal and will work closely with Blood, Tatum and Herz.

A combination of Blood, Weis and middle management can provide backfill after director of draft operations Brad Ciolek accepted a position with the Nationals as senior director of amateur scouting.