SAN DIEGO ---- The Padres hired Jed Hoyer as their new general manager on Saturday and will introduce him in a Monday afternoon press conference, according to multiple sources.

Although Padres CEO Jeff Moorad said in an e-mail Saturday that the team was "still working on it," a team source and a baseball source both said that the deal is done.

Hoyer, formerly an assistant general manager with the Boston Red Sox, replaces Kevin Towers, who was fired earlier this month after 14 seasons with the Padres.

Hoyer has spent the past seven seasons with the Red Sox. He started in the organization as an intern. He quickly became an important figure in general manager Theo Epstein's baseball operations department and served as the team's co-general manager when Epstein briefly stepped away from the sport in 2005.

From the beginning of Padres CEO Jeff Moorad's search, Hoyer was thought to be a leading candidate in a field of five to interview for the opening. Los Angeles Dodgers assistant general manager Kim Ng also interviewed for the position, but Moorad and the Padres have kept a tight lid on the identities of the other candidates, all of whom requested privacy.

Moorad informed Towers that he was beginning a search for a new general manager with three weeks remaining in the 2009 regular season. Towers was fired him on Oct. 3. At the time of Towers' dismissal, Moorad said he was well on the way to finding a replacement and he recently said he was "confident" he would find a strong replacement. Moorad expected to have his new head of baseball operations in place before the start of the World Series, which begins on Wednesday.

In the interim, the trio of executive vice president Paul DePodesta, assistant GM Fred Uhlman Jr. and manager Bud Black have been running the team's daily operations. The group has made several player moves, outrighting four players off the 40-man roster and adding another, Eulogio De La Cruz, but haven't had to make any major decisions.

Earlier this week, DePodesta said that the team's new general manager wouldn't have any pressing issues to deal with when he or she immediately stepped into office.

Hoyer, who turns 36 in December, is credited with helping Boston complete a trade with Florida that sent Hanley Ramirez to the Marlins in return for Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell.

He also accompanied Epstein on a November 2003 trip to Arizona in which the pair negotiated a contract extension over the Thanksgiving holiday that brought Curt Schilling in a trade to the Red Sox.

Hoyer previously interviewed for the Pittsburgh Pirates' general manager opening after the 2007 season and more recently for the Washington Nationals' opening in August.

He played college baseball at Wesleyan University where he was a pitcher, shortstop and a left fielder.