photo: Gary LaRocque and John Mozeliak (Brian Walton/The Cardinal Nation)
Via an internal promotion that occurred without fanfare during the off-season, the St. Louis Cardinals now have a third assistant general manager after adding the title to Director of Player Development Gary LaRocque.
Cardinals President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak told The Cardinal Nation, “Gary deserved and earned the promotion and it also recognized the balance of our group.”
Think of LaRocque, also known informally as the “farm director”, as the CEO of the Cardinals minor league operations – albeit a very hands-on leader. His staff take newly signed players and help all of them improve, with the best of them eventually becoming major leaguers.
Now in his 47th year of professional development and scouting, LaRocque has seen it all – and once performed many of the major jobs he oversees himself. He joined the Cardinals in late 2008 as senior special assistant to the general manager and assumed his role leading player development for the 2014 season.
“I am proud that Mo wanted me for this position,” LaRocque said. “It is a wonderful opportunity to do what I love.”
The diversity of work has great appeal to the newest AGM.
“Adjustments are required year-to-year,” he continued. “This season, we have 16 new staff members from a total of 50, including the performance department. It is a great challenge to bring everything together.”
Prior to joining the Cardinals, the Connecticut native spent 19 years scouting and in uniform in the Dodgers organization and a decade in various executive positions with the New York Mets.
While with the Dodgers, LaRocque was the Manager of the Year in the 1981 Pioneer League and the 1983 Gulf Coast League. He followed that with nine seasons as an amateur scout and regional scouting supervisor, also with Los Angeles.
LaRocque moved to the Mets in 1999 as their director of amateur scouting. He was promoted to vice president of player development and professional scouting in 2004.
Though development is always job no. 1, it is also important to instill in players a winning culture. LaRocque has championed a system that challenges prospects at a higher level than their current skills might indicate. The best can develop more quickly as a result, but the relative youth of the system overall has led to an interruption in the organization’s tradition of winning team results.
Despite their consistent regular season success placing them in the back half of First-Year Player Drafts annually, the Cardinals continue to crank out standout players, eventually ready for MLB duty. Scouting director Randy Flores and his scouts find them and LaRocque’s player development crew takes it from there.
Speaking of Flores, he and former international director Moises Rodriguez are currently the Cardinals’ other assistant general managers. Flores was promoted to the dual role in 2018, the year after Rodriguez moved up.
Among the internally developed players to become strong contributing major leaguers in the last five years alone include Dylan Carlson, Tommy Edman, Randy Arozarena, Adolis Garcia, Jordan Hicks, Dakota Hudson, Tyler O’Neill, Harrison Bader, Paul DeJong, Luke Voit, Sandy Alcantara and Jack Flaherty.
In a reminder of the organization’s commitment to promote internally, the two leaders of Baseball Operations are both former Cardinals AGMs themselves. General Manager Michael Girsch was assistant GM from 2011-2017 and Mozeliak was AGM from 2003-2007.
What may have been the ultimate validation of LaRocque’s value to the organization was his managers and coaches selecting him for the 2019 George Kissell Award – the Cardinals’ top honor for excellence in player development. It was the first time a non-uniformed individual received the Kissell Award in 20 years and the first executive selection ever.
Now, LaRocque can add “assistant general manager of the St. Louis Cardinals” to his long list of career accomplishments.
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