Arizona Diamondbacks tab Kevin Towers as next general manager

PHOENIX – The Arizona Diamondbacks have hired Kevin Towers as their next general manager.

The team will hold an afternoon news conference to introduce Towers, who spent 14 seasons as GM in San Diego, building a team that won four NL West titles and reached the 1998 World Series. He was fired in 2009 and spent this season as a special assistant for the New York Yankees.

Towers takes over a last-place team that fired manager A.J. Hinch and GM Josh Byrnes in June. Jerry Dipoto had been serving as the interim GM and was a finalist for the job.

The status of interim manager Kirk Gibson has not been determined.