Marlins hire Kim Ng as general manager

The Marlins made a historic hire on Friday morning — one that is widely believed to be long overdue by those around baseball — announcing that Kim Ng is their new general manager:

Ng, 51, has long been regarded as a future general manager in baseball circles but had yet to break the glass ceiling until now. In addition to becoming the first woman to serve as general manager for a major league team (and, in fact, the first woman to serve as GM in any of the four major North American men’s professional leagues), the Indianapolis native and University of Chicago grad is the first Asian American GM in MLB history.

She began her career in baseball as an intern in the White Sox’s front office back in 1990, topping out as the team’s assistant director of baseball operations and making history in 1995 by being the first woman and youngest person ever to present an arbitration case. In 1997, Ng got a brief taste of what would later go on to be a lengthy career working in league offices, serving as the American League’s director of waivers and records, before quickly returning to team front office work as the Yankees’ assistant general manager in 1998.

Ng departed the Bronx to take the same job (with the addition of a vice president title) with the Dodgers in 2001. In 2005, she began what seemed like it might be an endless cycle of interviews for vacant GM and president of baseball operations jobs, first interviewing for the Dodgers’ GM post. She departed Los Angeles’ front office to work in the comissioner’s office as senior VP of baseball operations in 2011, while still leaving the door open to return to team front office work if she was offered the chance to head up a baseball operations department. Now, nearly a decade later, she’ll finally get that chance.

With Ng now in place in Miami, the only remaining GM/president of baseball operations vacancies are with the Mets. Both position are likely to be extremely coveted given the large market and new owner Steve Cohen’s apparent willingness to spend in New York, as well as the strong core and apparent big budget in Philadelphia.