I doubted Billy Beane back in January after he traded Haren and Swisher saying the A’s had conceded the season. I learned my lesson. So when I read that Beane has become an avid soccer fan, which apparently has been ongoing for a few years, I became pretty concerned that he might lose his focus. And now SportsbyBrooks floats the idea that Beane could one day leave the A’s to run the San Jose Earthquakes or something. The idea makes sense since Lew Wolff owns both teams and wants to see the Quakes succeed. And as you could imagine, Beane is already bringing his Moneyball philosophies to MLS.
So is it possible that Beane directs his concentration fully on the Quakes? Is it possible that he’s already been spending a lot of time doing soccer anyway and we just don’t know it? One piece of evidence is from Tracy Ringolsby who takes assistant GM David Forst turning down interviews as a sign. I’m not so sure that’s much of an indication given what Beane taught his previous assistants — only take a job when you’re ready to succeed at it. Plus, Forst may have seen what happened with DePodesta and realized he has a good thing going. And like I speculated, we don’t know how Beane spends his time anyway. But there was a day when Beane was going to take the Red Sox job, so you know new projects entice him. I’ll just hope for the Angels’ sake that he’s shifting his focuses.
