Magical Billy Beane Continues To Successfully Build Surprising Oakland Athletics

In 1995, the owner of the Oakland Athletics, Walter Hass Jr., died. Successors Stephen Scott and Ken Hofman had watched Hass spend an abundant amount of money on players, and they wanted to go into an entirely different direction.

The duo immediately implored then-general manager Sandy Alderson to become cost-effective—to slash payroll, focus more on the farm system’s development, and abide by sabermetric principles in obtaining relatively undervalued players.

Alderson did what they said, but it didn’t translate into success. The Athletics had losing records from the time the new mindset was put in place until...

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