Heavy Hitter

He gives lectures to Deutsche Bank executives. He’s rubbed shoulders with billionaire investor Warren Buffett. And he’s been offered millions to ply his trade elsewhere. So, what the heck is Oakland A’s General Manager billy beane still doing in the East Bay?

Photograph by Thomas Broening

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This insight merged with the ideal mentor in onetime A’s General Manager Sandy Alderson, a former Marine officer and a Harvard Law School graduate. Beane always felt comfortable around Alderson, in part because, with Alderson’s military background, he reminded Beane of his father. Alderson also looked at the game in a fresh way, eager to lean on objective statistical data—on-base percentage, for example—rather than only on the impressions of a scout.

Before long, Beane moved from A’s bench player to advance scout, to Alderson’s assistant, to general manager, taking the last step following the ’97 season, when Alderson had been promoted to team president (he subsequently left to take a job with Major League Baseball and is currently chief executive officer of the San Diego Padres). Beane, who clearly likes to build more than merely maintain, came to relish reshaping the team, a perpetual task given its economic constraints. In that sense, Beane may have found himself the perfect job.

Beane’s favorite memories involve the midseason trading deadline, full of nonstop phone calls and frenzied negotiations—all while he and his staff ate out of pizza boxes and worked through the night.

They were young, energetic, and, as Beane admits, occasionally “sophomoric.” He recalls one trade in which the A’s repeatedly called an opposing general manager’s cell phone, jamming the line so no other teams could reach the GM while he sat at a game.

In very little time, Beane built the A’s into an annual contender: They won 91 games in 2000, then 102 in ’01, and 103 in ’02 (baseball’s all-time record is 116 wins in a 162-game season). The Boston Red Sox called Beane in November 2002 and offered him a five-year, $12.5 million deal to become general manager. He would be a rich man with a bottomless budget, working for one of the game’s most storied clubs in a deeply passionate baseball city. It was too good to resist, so Beane accepted the job … and changed his mind the next day.

“It was more important to be out here, where all my family is, and I could do the things professionally I enjoy doing, anyway,” he says now. “I haven’t regretted it for a day. Not one day.”

The Red Sox were the most public suitor, but several other teams made discreet runs at him—and he planted his flag deeper in the East Bay each time. Beane’s family clearly is a huge factor. His parents still live in Southern California, as does his teenage daughter Casey (from a previous marriage). His wife, Tara, grew up in Danville, where she and Beane now reside.

Beyond these connections, Beane savors the freedom and lifestyle of working for the A’s and living in the Bay Area. Nobody flinches at his shorts and sandals. And even if some fans loudly express their discontent with his letting go of popular players, the public scrutiny doesn’t begin to rival what it would be in a more baseball-centric environment.

“The great thing about the Bay Area is the realization that sports are great but they also have their place,” Beane says. “I can go into Starbucks, and my neighbors have accomplished far more than I ever will. … At this point in my career, the quality of life that comes with being here is much more appealing than being in, say, Boston or New York.”