Daniel O'Dowd

Daniel J. O'Dowd

• School Rollins College

• Born September 6, 1959 in Morristown, NJ USA

Biographical Information

Dan O'Dowd was the General Manager of the Colorado Rockies from September of 1999 until after the 2014 season. In 2006, during his tenure, the Rockies began explicitly looking for players of "character", defining character as being Christian. O'Dowd said he was nervous others would be offended by their policy, which clearly was offensive to many. In 2012, he became the team's Chief Baseball Operating Officer. That was the year he implemented a radical plan to use a four-man starting rotation with his pitchers working with a very limited pitch count; the strategy did not produce obvious positive results and was soon abandoned. He resigned following the 2014 season, as the Rockies had made the postseason only twice in the preceding 20 years, 15 of which were under O'Dowd's command. Senior Vice-President Bill Geivett, who had significant responsibilities related to the day-to-day on-field operations of the club, resigned at the same time.

Prior to joining the Rockies, O'Dowd worked in the front office of the Baltimore Orioles through 1987 in various capacities including sales and marketing and minor league operations. He moved to the Cleveland Indians as director of player development from 1988 to 1992 and assistant GM from 1993 to 1998.

O'Dowd's son, Chris O'Dowd, began his pro career in 2012 in the San Diego Padres organization.

Preceded by Bob Gebhard

Colorado Rockies General Manager 1999-2014

Succeeded by Jeff Bridich

Record as a General Manager

Draft Picks

1st Round

• 2000: 7th overall P Matt Harrington - Palmdale High School Did Not Sign
• 2001: 44th overall OF Jayson Nix - Midland (TX) High School
• 2002: 9th overall P Jeff Francis - University of British Columbia
• 2003: 10th overall 3B Ian Stewart - La Quinta High School (Westminster, CA)
• 2004: 9th overall SS Chris Nelson - Redan High School
• 2005: 7th overall SS Troy Tulowitzki - Long Beach State University
• 2005: 32nd overall P Chaz Roe - Lafayette High School (Lexington, KY)
• 2006: 2nd overall P Greg Reynolds - Stanford University
• 2007: 8th overall P Casey Weathers - Vanderbilt University
• 2008: 25th overall P Christian Friedrich - Eastern Kentucky University
• 2009: 11th overall P Tyler Matzek - Capistrano Valley High School
• 2010: 26th overall OF Kyle Parker - Clemson University
• 2011: 20th overall P Tyler Anderson - University of Oregon

Other Notable Selections

• 2000: 5th round (137th overall) 3B Garrett Atkins - University of California, Irvine
• 2000: 11th round (317th overall) P Brad Hawpe - Louisiana State University
• 2002: 11th round (321st overall) 1B Ryan Shealy - University of Florida
• 2008: 2nd Round (72nd overall) OF Charlie Blackmon - Georgia Institute of Technology
• 2009: 1st Supplemental (34th overall) P Rex Brothers - Lipscomb University
• 2009: 2nd Round (59th overall) 3B Nolan Arenado - El Toro High School

Significant Trades

• November 16, 1999 traded Darryl Kile, Luther Hackman and Dave Veres to the St. Louis Cardinals for Jose Jimenez, Manuel Aybar, Rick Croushore and Brent Butler
• December 13, 1999 as part of a four team trade sent Vinny Castilla to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Justin Miller to the Oakland A's, Henry Blanco and Jamey Wright to the Milwaukee Brewers for Rolando Arrojo and Aaron Ledesma from Tampa Bay and Jeff Cirillo and Scott Karl from Milwaukee.
• July 27, 2000 traded Rolando Arrojo, Rick Croushore and Mike Lansing to the Boston Red Sox for Jeff Frye, Brian Rose, John Wasdin and Jeff Taglienti
• July 31, 2000 traded Tom Goodwin to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Todd Hollandsworth, Kevin Gibbs and Randey Dorame
• June 2, 2001 traded Josh Bard and Jody Gerut to the Cleveland Indians for Jacob Cruz
• July 25, 2001 traded Neifi Perez to the Kansas City Royals for Jermaine Dye
• July 25, 2001 traded Jermaine Dye to the Oakland A's for Jose Ortiz, Mario Encarnacion and Todd Belitz
• December 16, 2001 traded Jeff Cirillo to the Seattle Mariners for Jose Paniagua, Dennis Stark and Brian Fuentes
• January 21, 2002 as part of a three team trade sent Craig House and Ross Gload to the New York Mets and Alex Ochoa to the Milwaukee Brewers for Todd Zeile and Benny Agbayani from the Mets.
• November 16, 2002 traded Mike Hampton and Juan Pierre to the Florida Marlins for Charles Johnson, Preston Wilson, Pablo Ozuna and Vic Darensbourg
• December 14, 2003 as part of a three team trade sent Justin Speier to the Toronto Blue Jays for Joe Kennedy from the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and Sandy Nin from Toronto
• August 6, 2004 traded Larry Walker to the St. Louis Cardinals for Jason Burch, Chris Narveson and Luis Martinez
• July 28, 2005 traded Shawn Chacon to the New York Yankees for Ramon Ramirez and Eduardo Sierra
• July 31, 2006 traded Ryan Shealy and Scott Dohmann to the Kansas City Royals for Jeremy Affeldt and Denny Bautista
• December 12, 2006 traded Jason Jennings and Miguel Asencio to the Houston Astros for Willy Taveras, Jason Hirsh and Taylor Buchholz

Significant Signings

• December 4, 2000 signed Denny Neagle as a Free Agent from New York Yankees
• December 9, 2000 signed Mike Hampton as a free agent from New York Mets
• January 9, 2004 signed Jeromy Burnitz as a free agent from Los Angeles Dodgers

Related Sites

• Dan O'Dowd at the SABR Bio Project