Derrick Hall's inexplicable rise continues

He was once the director of communications for the Dodgers. Ten years ago, he did a sports-talk show in the mornings on Los Angeles radio. He filled in at Channel 4 for Fred Roggin on the sports desk.

Today, Derrick Hall was promoted to chief executive officer of the Arizona Diamondbacks.

It comes as the news hits that Jeff Moorad, who is pretty close to buying the San Diego Padres from John Moores, resigned as the D'backs CEO, leading the team to bring Hall up from team president to new CEO.

Moorad, a UCLA grad, is a former agent who represented several players such as Eric Karros and Manny Ramirez (before Scott Boras took over). Showing how much income he'd procured over the years by representing highly paid athletes, he bought a share of the D'backs back in '04.

Hall spent 12 seasons in the Dodgers' organization, most under the Peter O'Malley ownership, leaving in 2004 after he had built a career as the team's Senior VP of Communications -- in charge of protecting the team's image and brand promoting. He taught a public relations class at USC.

In 1999, he did a three-hour morning sports talk show with John Ireland at XTRA-AM (1150), which had the Dodgers games at the time.

He joined the D'backs in May 2005 as senior vice president of communications, a couple of years after he had left as the Dodgers' main spokesman (he left when the McCourts took over). Hall added marketing to his title in December, '05, and he was promoted to president in Sept., '06. He'll keep that title as well as the new CEO badge.