JEFF LUHNOW
Jeff Luhnow graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a dual bachelor’s degree in economics and engineering before earning his MBA from Northwestern’s acclaimed Kellogg School of Management.
He was the founder of Archetype Solutions, a data analytics firm; he was a high-level management executive for the Garden Grove, CA.-based discounter Petstore.com; and he worked for five years at the global consulting firm, McKinsey & Company.
Born and raised for his first fifteen years in Mexico City and a U.S. citizen, he is fluent in Spanish which would prove to be quite helpful in his next endeavor.
Luhnow joined the front office of the St. Louis Cardinals in 2003, a hiring which raised an eyebrow or two as he had no prior experience in baseball save for playing the game in high school. He was thirty-seven.
Bill DeWitt, Jr., the Managing Partner and Chairman of the organization was intrigued by the Oakland A’s’ and GM Billy Beane’s Moneyball approach to assembling a competitive baseball team — featuring analytical, evidence-based sabermetrics — without breaking the bank.
Luhnow knew DeWitt’s son-in-law from his days at McKinsey, got an audience with DeWitt and landed the job.
His presence was not met with universal in-house approval; he was derided with barbed monikers such as, “the accountant” and “Harry Potter.” And he had to deal with those old-fashioned traditional sorts who preferred to analyze the game with their eyes, heads and hearts rather than to employ the color-by-number (and keyboard) technique.
It wasn’t easy.
Beginning his Cardinals executive career as the vice-president of baseball development, his fluency in Spanish was no doubt of great value when tasked with the responsibilities of establishing a baseball academy in the Dominican Republic and broadening the scope of the team’s scouting operations in Venezuela.
In 2005 he was promoted to the position of vice-president of player procurement which made him the director of amateur, international and domestic scouting and in 2006 he received another bump, being named the team’s vice-president of scouting and player development.
His success at each stop along the way was undeniable; the St. Louis Post-Dispatch picked up the thread writing in 2006, “If you aren’t familiar with Jeff Luhnow, then remember the name. Why? One day he’ll be running the Cardinals.”
Under his watch the Cardinals won five minor league championships and had the best system-wide minor league record in 2010. The first three Cardinals drafts overseen by Luhnow (2005–2007) produced 24 future major leaguers, the most of any team over that span.
Several players who were instrumental in the Cards’ 2011 World Series Championship — Jaime Garcia, Allen Craig, Jon Jay and Lance Lynn — were drafted during his tenure.
And the 2013 World Series team still had his imprint all over it; he drafted 16 of the 25 players on that WS roster.
Repeated clashing with the band of old-school idealists in St. Louis — including Hall-of-Fame manager Tony La Russa — apparently became so burdensome for Luhnow that when he was presented with an opportunity to leave, he did just that in 2011, replacing veteran GM Ed Wade in Houston.
Jim Crane grew up in St. Louis and was a big fan of the 11-time World Series champion Cardinals. When he bought the Houston Astros in November of 2011 he immediately fired Wade and hired Luhnow.
Impressed with the way Luhnow had built and cultivated the St. Louis farm system, Crane wanted the same for Houston. His hunch was a good one but it took a while to bear fruit.
The Astros had reached the World Series in 2005 where they helped the White Sox throw off the shackles of 88 years worth of championship failure, being swept in four games.
But they had made it to the Series.
Six years later their record was 56–106, then a franchise-record for losses. And it got worse. 107 losses in 2012. 111 losses in 2013. Dubious distinctions for the organization which conjured images of the expansion Houston Colt .45s in 1962. (In fact in ’62 the first-year Colt .45s lost only 96 games).
Luhnow understood the process but wasn’t happy. After the 2013 season he changed the license plate on his car to read, “GM 111” as a not-so-subtle reminder of where the franchise had been and how far it had to go.
You’re only as good as your record says you are but wins and losses don’t always tell the whole tale.
In the 2012 draft the Astros turned the first pick into Carlos Correa and added pitcher Lance McCullers later in the first round. In the seventh round they grabbed outfielder Preston Tucker, a slugger from the University of Florida who had set school records for most hits (341); RBI (258); and AB (1,035) and finished second in school history with 57 HRs while batting .329.
(Although it didn’t work out with Tucker who was ultimately traded to the Braves, that did not deter Luhnow from drafting his younger brother Kyle with the fifth overall selection in the 2015 MLB Draft. He began the 2018 season with Houston’s PCL Triple-A affiliate Fresno Grizzlies. Kyle Tucker at this writing was batting .508 [30–59] during a 14-game hitting streak extended 06/25/2018 and his arrival in Houston is highly anticipated).
Since assuming the role of GM, Luhnow has acquired 37 of the 40 players on the current 40-man roster. The three he did not acquire — Jose Altuve, Dallas Keuchel and George Springer — are big contributors surely but Luhnow deserves credit for deciding to keep them when they were no-names and building a championship-caliber team around them.
A chronological timeline of the Luhnow Houston rebuild looks something like this:
December 8, 2011 — Acquired Marwin Gonzalez for Marco Duarte. Gonzalez has hit .268/.741 OPS/224 RBI over six seasons with Astros and Duarte has not yet reached the majors;
June 4, 2012 — Selected Correa and McCullers;
July 20, 2012 — Acquired Joe Musgrove who pitched in four 2017 WS games and was the winning pitcher in Game 5;
August 3, 2012 — Acquired Chris Devenski who has posted a 2.38 ERA in 110 appearances and has led Astro relievers twice in Ks through 2017; Devenski won Game 2 of 2017 WS;
February 4, 2013 — Acquired Brad Peacock who was 13–2 with a 3.00 ERA in 2017; Peacock saved Game 3 of 2017 WS;
December 18, 2013 — Claimed Collin McHugh who has made 102 starts with a 3.70 ERA;
June 5, 2014 — Selected Derek Fisher #37 in the 2014 draft. He has hit .282/.372/.488 over 4 minor league seasons and made his Major League debut in 2018;
November 3, 2014 — Claimed Will Harris who has posted a 2.30 ERA in 180 appearances and was named a 2016 All-Star;
December 12,2014 — Signed free agent Luke Gregerson: 3.66 ERA in 188 appearances (2015–2017);
July 31, 2014 — Acquired Jake Marisnick: .243 & 16 HRs in 230 ABs in 2017;
January 14, 2015 — Acquired Evan Gattis: .251/.303/.477 with 71 HRs (2015–2017);
June 8, 2015 — Selected Alex Bregman: .279/.342/.476 in 204 games through 2017;
December 12, 2015 — Acquired Ken Giles who has converted 49 of 58 save attempts (84%) through 2017;
July 16, 2016 — Signed Yuli Gurriel: .291/.324/.466 with 90 RBI in 175 games through 2017;
November 16, 2016 — Signed Charlie Morton who went 14–7 with a 3.62 ERA and a team-high 163 Ks in 2017 and pitched five shutout innings in ALCS Game 7; Morton won Game 7 of 2017 WS;
November 17, 2016 — Acquired Brian McCann: .241/.323/.436 in 2017;
November 23, 2016 — Signed Josh Reddick: .314 BA with 83 RBI in 2017;
December 5, 2016 — Signed Carlos Beltran;
August 31, 2017 — Acquired Cameron Maybin who was 3rd. in AL with 33 SB in 2017;
August 31, 2017 — Acquired Justin Verlander two minutes before the 9/1 non-waiver trade deadline. Went 5–0 with a 1.06 ERA in 5 regular season starts and was 4–0 with a 1.46 ERA in four postseason starts.
The Houston Astros won the AL Pennant and went on to defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers in seven games in the 2017 World Series.
In the off-season they added pitchers Gerrit Cole, Joe Smith and Hector Rondon.
As of June 27, 2018 their record is 54–28 good for first place in the AL West.
Spin rates, exit velocities and bat speed matter, as do data-driven decisions, information gathering and prudent hires.
“There’s so much you can learn,” Luhnow says. “This is management consulting 101. How are you doing relative to your competition? Are there any best practices from your industry, or outside your industry, that you can quickly apply to get better? That’s really what it is.”
Like him and his methods or not, Luhnow builds beautifully.
The Cardinals thought so even after he flew the coop and they hacked into the Astros’ internal player database known as Ground Control 50 times in 16 months to see what he was up to.
Illegally surveilling Houston’s trade and draft discussions, player evaluations etc. cost the Cardinals $2 million — the maximum amount MLB can fine one of its clubs — and their top two picks in the 2017 draft (56th. & 75th. overall), the projected value of which is around $15 to $20 million.
The penalty may not be commensurate to the damage done but the Astros are happy to have closure on the issue.
As for Luhnow?
He’s been busy changing his license plates — not making them as the Cardinals’ former scouting director and hacking campaign perpetrator Chris Correa may be doing during his 46-month stay in a federal penitentiary.
“GM 111” has been replaced by “OCTOBB,” which in turn has been retired in favor of “WS112.”
The last is commemorative of the Astros World Series championship in 2017 and the number of wins — 101 in the regular season and 11 in the postseason — it took to get there.
[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in June 2018.]
Addendum: Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch were suspended by MLB for the 2020 season and then fired by Astros owner Jim Crane for the role each played in Houston’s sign-stealing scandal, effective January 13, 2020.
A league investigation confirmed that the Astros had cheated by using a camera-based sign-stealing system during the regular season and playoffs of their World Series-winning 2017 campaign and during part of the 2018 regular season.
