Perhaps off-topic but are (Google) SREs the Ops-equivalent of Data Scientists in terms of expectation of cross-domain skills? Mikey Dickerson's LinkedIn profile [0] shows he's a champ in S/W Engg + Distributed Systems + Sys-Admin + what-not. I know calling each of them a "domain" is a bit of a stretch but I couldn't come up with a better term.
[0] www.linkedin.com/in/mikeydickerson
To a one, SREs are the smartest group of people I've met, with a ton of practical knowledge about distributed systems, a strong quantitative bent, and a desire to fix problems on live systems. If you want to call that the Ops equivalent of data scientists, fine, but I prefer think of them of scientists who study the failure of distributed systems in a live environment.
It's pretty fun.
Then make sure you have great monitoring because it will still fail at runtime and you're the poor sap on call who has to deal with it.