A former executive for the Los Angeles Dodgers and part owner of the San Diego Padres died this week.
Kevin O’Malley died at the age of 50 of complications of sepsis, his father, former Dodgers president Peter O’Malley, said, as reported by the Associated Press.
The younger O’Malley was in hospice care in Santa Barbara after falling ill in New York last fall.
Prior to that, though, he worked for the Dodgers organization in Great Falls, Montana, and at Dodgertown in Vero Beach, Florida.
“His grandfather, Walter O’Malley, owned the Dodgers from 1944 to 1979 and was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame as an executive who expanded MLB to the West Coast,” the AP explained. “Peter O’Malley was president of the Dodgers from 1970 to 1998.”
That expansion to the West Coast specifically involved the Dodgers’ move from Brooklyn to LA before the 1958 season, and his time atop the Dodgers included Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier.
Kevin O’Malley devoted his life to baseball
Kevin O’Malley also blazed his own trail in baseball.
“He was co-founder and owner of Top of the Third Inc., which owned and operated the Stockton Mudville Nine and Visalia Rawhide, minor league teams in Central California.
“In 2012, he became a part owner of the Padres along with the Seidler and O’Malley families, who sold the team in April,” the AP reports.
“Baseball was important to him,” Peter O’Malley said. “Family came first, but baseball was a close second.”
What did the Dodgers say about Kevin O’Malley’s passing?
The team issued a statement after O’Malley’s death.
“The Dodgers send their sincere condolences to the family of Kevin O’Malley, who passed away Tuesday at age 50,” the team wrote on social media. “Our thoughts and sympathies go out to his wife Allison, his children Grace, Brendan, Brooke and Margaret, his father Peter and all of his loved ones.”
