Billy Beane
Billy Beane
William Lamar "Billy" Beane IIIis an American former professional baseball player and current front office executive. He is the Executive Vice President of Baseball Operations and minority owner of the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball. Prior to his front office career, he played in MLB as an outfielder between 1984 and 1989 for the New York Mets, Minnesota Twins, Detroit Tigers, and Oakland Athletics. He joined the Athletics front office as a scout in 1990. He was named general...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBaseball Player
Date of Birth29 March 1962
CityOrlando, FL
CountryUnited States of America
When it comes to working, Matt can be a little nutty. We wanted to make sure he realized work is secondary. Obviously, he's here because he's a very good employee, but our interest in him is as a person, first. There are far more important things in life than your job.
Frank Thomas is a presence. Not only would he be our type of offensive player, he would be everybody's type of offensive player. ... If Frank is healthy, he's been good against everybody.
I don't view having too many good players as a problem.
We have four very good rookies, but at the risk of saying it before the season is over, it would be pretty tough to find an explanation for choosing somebody else.
We're fine with Joe as the only lefty down there. He was a very good reliever for us before Rich got hurt, and I expect him to be a very good reliever for us again. He has all the tools for success.
This is the first time since I've been here that we haven't spent the off-season replacing what we've lost. We felt like we were very competitive last year. . . . In particular, when we were healthy, it was a very, very good team. So the idea that we were adding to this group . . . it's a first for us since I've been here as the general manager.
Ken did a great job for us. We've always said that. He was a good enough manager for us to want him back before, and he's still a good enough manager to come back.
It would be malpractice not to do research. Of course, it would also be malpractice to make a foolish trade.
It was an emotional time for the family, a life decision for them. The fact that we didn't agree right away wasn't unusual, given the magnitude of the decision.
Essentially this has been a business that's been around for over a hundred years and it really hasn't changed much so any time someone's doing something differently, its probably going to create some friction.
Even at this time his career, people stop to watch him come to the plate. I know I have.
Both (Williams and Thomas) are highly competitive, highly successful people. It's temporary noise.
Assuming we're healthy, Kenny's not going to have his hands tied very often.
At this point, both sides have agreed to pursue other options. We were just too far apart. I don't think we were ever going to be able to bridge the gap. ... When you're so far apart, there's no sense going through the exercise.