(KTLA) — Former Major League Baseball player and executive Billy Bean, a trailblazer in the LGBTQ community for sports, has died at age 60, the league announced Tuesday.
Bean, a Santa Ana, Calif., native who attended Loyola Marymount University, succumbed to leukemia, the league said on X.
An outfielder, Bean played professionally for 10 years, six of which were spent in the majors. He ended with a lifetime batting average of .226, with 108 hits and five home runs for the Detroit Tigers, Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres.
Despite his limited professional success on the field, Bean made a big impact on the game.
In 1999, the New York Times noted he was the “first major-league baseball player to publicly discuss his homosexuality to this extent” when he came out as a member of the LGBTQ community. In recent years, Bean — not to be confused with Billy Beane, the Oakland Athletics executive featured in the book and movie “Moneyball” — served as MLB’s senior vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion and special assistant to the commissioner.
“Over the last 10 years, Billy worked passionately and tirelessly with MLB and all 30 Clubs, focusing on player education, LGBTQ inclusion, and social justice initiatives to advance equality in the game for all,” MLB said.
It is for those efforts that Bean will be remembered, Commissioner Rob Manfred said in MLB’s announcement.
Bean was “one of the kindest and most respected individuals I have ever known” and someone who “made baseball a better institution, both on and off the field,” Manfred said.