MLB Succession Questions Rise With Manfred Confidant’s Departure

One of Rob Manfred’s most trusted deputies is departing Major League Baseball, potentially reshaping the forthcoming race to be the next commissioner. 

Chris Marinak, most recently MLB’s chief operations and strategy officer and with the league since 2008, will leave at the end of the year for an as-yet-unannounced role elsewhere. During his long run with baseball, Marinak has been involved in nearly every facet of the commissioner’s office, including labor, scheduling, technology and instant replay, marketing, ticketing, international, and special events.

Marinak was also involved in many of the technical aspects of the 2023 introduction of the pitch clock, a massively successful effort that has reduced average game times and, in turn, helped spur sizable increases in MLB attendance and viewership. 

That wide-ranging experience, plus a steady, calm demeanor, made him a fast-riser within MLB’s executive ranks. Marinak’s name had also been informally mentioned as a potential candidate to succeed Manfred when his current contract expires in January 2029, and he intends to retire.

In addition to labor negotiations next year with the MLB Players Association and beginning talks soon thereafter on a new set of national media rights, MLB owners will also need to develop a process to select Manfred’s successor. 

Manfred and several others within the sport are believed to favor candidates already within baseball, as opposed to an entirely outside hire. That could lend support to other existing in-house possibilities, such as Noah Garden, MLB deputy commissioner for business and media. 

Regardless of how the succession process shakes out, though, there is an evolving, more open, and less tradition-bound thinking within MLB ownership, Manfred said, on a wide range of topics.

“Our ownership group has changed a lot,” he said in September at the Front Office Sports Tuned In summit. “Today, owners say, ‘Explain to me how it’s going to drive my business.’ That’s a very different mentality.”

Parallels to Football

The situation with Marinak could also bear some similarity to the situation around former NFL chief media and business officer Brian Rolapp. Also one mentioned as a future commissioner candidate to succeed Roger Goodell, Rolapp instead left the league in June to become CEO of the PGA Tour. 

Even with that departure, Rolapp is still seen within football circles as a potential successor to Goodell, and the PGA Tour experience could ultimately enhance that candidacy. Depending on where Marinak goes and what he does, Marinak could find himself back within consideration for the top MLB job.