Nationals Farm Authority

Barry Svrluga with some PD news in his first blog entry this morning.

The Nationals are about to name Bobby Williams (son of former Orlando Magic GM/Pres Pat Williams) director of player development — replacing Andy Dunn, who resigned last month amidst a restructuring that also took out some lower-level people. It’s essentially the farm director position, working under VP Bob Boone, who oversees all that. Williams managed in A ball for the franchise and was slated to be a coach at Class AAA this year.

Williams was the manager of the Savannah Sand Gnats in 2006 and Vermont in 2005. From my time down in Viera, I saw Williams running parts of the accelerated spring training. He has no pedigree at this point in player development from the management side. But it appears the Nationals saw enough in him to elevate him in the coaching hierachy. His experience with the Nationals thus far leads me to believe he’s on the same page as the rest of the organization.

UPDATE: Here is the press release

The Washington Nationals today named Bobby Williams as Director of Player Development and Mark Scialabba as Assistant Director of Player Development. Nationals Vice President and General Manager Jim Bowden and Assistant General Manager and Vice President, Player Development Bob Boone made the joint announcement.

Williams enters his third season with the Nationals. Last season, Williams managed Savannah of the Single-A South Atlantic League, and in 2005, he managed Vermont of the short-season Single-A New York-Penn League in his first season with the organization.

Before joining the Nationals, Williams spent five seasons (2000-04) coaching at various levels in Cincinnati ’s minor-league system. After being drafted by Baltimore in 1995 (he did not sign), Williams played collegiately at Rollins College (Bachelor’s degree), before embarking on a coaching career at Georgia Southern (MBA and Master’s degree) in 1999. His father, Pat, is currently an Executive Vice President with the NBA’s Orlando Magic and is a well-known author.

Scialabba accepts his new role after joining the Nationals last season as an assistant in the baseball operations department. After earning a degree and playing baseball at Williams (MA) College, Scialabba earned a Master’s degree in sports management from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. He began his career in baseball as the Assistant General Manager of the Brewster Whitecaps of the Cape Cod Baseball League in 2005.

 Additionally, the Nationals made their first round of cuts today, of note:

• IF Tony Womack was released, as mentioned by Barry, that’s no shock once Ronnie Belliard was signed
• LHP Mike Hinckley to Harrisburg: It will be interesting to see who joins him in Harriburg’s rotation with the most likely candidates being Collin Balester, Clint Everts, and Garrett Mock
• OF Frank Diaz to Columbus: He’ll be the starting CF in Columbus and could be an option in CF for Washington if Logan struggles. He’s still not developed with the bat, but he plays an above average CF (sounds familiar … huh?)
• Reassigned to minor league camp (none were getting any playing time of note or were likely to be options for the 25-man, they’ll get playing time over at the minor league complex):
• IFs Tony Blanco & Melvin Dorta
• OF Wayne Lydon
• 1B Jorge Toca
• OF George Lombard
• RHPs Felix Diaz, Anastacio Martinez, & Eduardo Valdez
• LHP Luis Martinez & Bill White