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Billy Beane Moves to new role with A’s; David Forst to take over Baseball Operations

Dominic Gutierrez / MLB / November 18, 2022

Billy Beane moving up with A’s; David Forst to take over Baseball Operations

Billy Beane, the mastermind for Moneyball, has been in the Oakland A’s front office for over 30 years. On Friday, he’ll be starting a new position with the team and will slowly grow apart from baseball operations.

Beane is set to become a senior advisor to the A’s managing partner and owner John Fisher. He will work closely with Fisher on “strategic decisions,” and will continue to support the work of baseball operations which now belongs to general manager David Forst. The A’s Public Relations account on Twitter announced the news Friday via a media release.

A’s EVP of Baseball Operations Billy Beane will assume a new role as Senior Advisor to the Managing Partner, working closely with John Fisher on strategic decisions. In this new role, Beane will support the work of baseball operations now headed by General Manager David Forst. pic.twitter.com/LNWJnEa2J1
— Oakland A's Communications (@AthleticsPR) November 18, 2022

Beane has been the vice president of baseball operations since 2016. Before then, he was the general manager for 19 years. Prior to this announcement, Beane had been the longest-tenured baseball operations leader in MLB.

Forst, who has been the general manager since 2016, will now oversee all of baseball operations. Like many general managers today, Forst will have the role of President of Baseball Operations and general manager. There’s still a possibility Forst is fully promoted and a new general manager is named. Current assistant general manager Billy Owens would be the best bet.

This new role allows Beane to pursue other non-baseball sporting interests while continuing to hold an important role with the A’s.

Beane has shown interest in this before, most recently in 2020. He was expected to leave the A’s to join Fenway Sports Group, which was set to partner with RedBall Acquisition Corp. Fenway Sports Group owns Boston Red Sox, Liverpool FC, a stake in Roush Fenway Racing. RedBall was seeking to acquire a 20% to 25% stake in the company. Beane was co-chair the group, and they would’ve focused attention on many projects such as European soccer. However, the deal fell through which resulted in Beane staying with the A’s.

Beane was seen as a front-office mastermind for his work with a low payroll team. Despite low cash, Beane has been able to make the A’s a playoff team 11 times in a span of 25 years. Even with constant rebuilds, the A’s haven’t endured more than three consecutive losing seasons under his guidance. The A’s rebuild of 2015-2017 was only three seasons, which lead to a 97-win team in 2018 to end it.

Overall, this is a win for all parties. Beane is able to stay with the A’s but explore other opportunities after a long baseball operations career. For Forst and the rest of the front office, it allows them to shine without being in the shadow of Beane. With a rebuilding A’s team, their offseason is already off to a hot start with this news.