Chicago White Sox vice president and assistant general manager Rick Hahn will interview for the vacant GM job for the Los Angeles Angels, according to Tim Brown of Yahoo! Sports. That brings the total number of interviews to at least five:
- Hahn
- Kim Ng, current MLB executive and former assistant GM with the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Yankees
- Jerry Dipoto, senior VP of scouting and player development with the Arizona Diamondbacks
- Billy Eppler, senior director of pro psersonnel for the New York Yankees
- Damon Oppenheimer, VP of amateur scouting for the Yankees
In addition to those five, Thad Levine has been mentioned in numerous reports as a candidate for the Angels, but they would have to wait until the conclusion of World Series as Levine is currently the assistant GM for the Texas Rangers.
Hahn has been with the White Sox for the last 11 years, assisting GM Kenny Williams with player evaluations, roster composition, contract negotiations, trades, as well as overseeing the baseball operations staff, including scouting and player development. Hahn has been credited with negotiating multi-year deals with current White Sox Mark Buehrle, Paul Konerko, Alexei Ramirez, and Matt Thornton.
Baseball America in 2010 ranked Hahn as the top GM candidate in baseball. Hahn was also tops in a similar feature by Sport Illustrated in July, in which Hahn joked, "if there was a way to trade me for Mike Trout, I'm guessing Kenny would drive me to the airport to make sure that deal goes through -- and I would understand."
Not that Hahn would cost an uber prospect like Trout, but that was some nice foreshadowing.
For more on Angels baseball, head to Halos Heaven.