It happened to me too a few years back. A posting cropped up with the company hiring for two positions right above mine to fill out direction needs, I was a technical lead already. I wanted the position, because I was already filling the role they were hiring for.

I was shut down right when I inquired, and told that the company wanted some outside talent. Wow okay, even though my performance reviews were dazzling. So they hired two guys who had zero familiarity with the industry and zero familiarity with our stack. One had to be fired because he was insane and did nothing all day but try to be some motivational speaker in a technical role. I liked the other guy, but it was another person I had to explain stuff to when he had preconceived notions that were incorrect. He was cool, but HR/execs really screwed up the positioning.

There was a later time when they were going to have a leadership vacuum. I decided it best to quit at that time because they were going to ask me to help by advancing _only_ when they needed me as a backup. However, when I asked them to advance, they just said not interested. So too bad, had a better offer to advance elsewhere and their interest in me was clear.