Billy Bean, a special assistant to the commissioner and senior vice president for diversity, equity, and inclusion at MLB, passed suddenly. On Tuesday, August 6, 2024, he passed away following a year-long battle with leukemia. Baseball looked up to him as a tremendous leader and role model when it came to inclusionary concerns.
For many years to come, Billy’s efforts to promote equality in baseball will be felt. But his GM job changed MLB and had such a profound effect on the sport.
He will be mistaken for Billy Beane of the A’s by non-fans.
A.J. Perez expressed his deep feeling, saying: “The Billy Bean who unfortunately passed away today after a battle with leukemia isn’t the Moneyball Billy Beane. Bean, 60, was MLB’s SVP of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion—and was the second MLB player to publicly come out after his playing career ended. RIP (Photo via @MLB)”
The news that Bill has passed away has startled friends and family, and everyone has been commenting on various social media sites to express their sorrow.
“Feel for Billy Beane right now….it must suck having another person whos associated with baseball and was named Billy Bean and was gay, die. They need to put a HUGE asterisk next to this dudes death announcements that says *not moneyball Billy. Cus my first thought was, I didn’t know he was gay.”
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