Cedric Tallis

Cedric Tallis (July 29, 1914 – May 8, 1991) was an American executive in Major League Baseball who served as the first general manager of the expansion Kansas City Royals and later played an important role in the New York Yankees' dynasty of the late 1970s.

Tallis was the general manager of teams in minor league baseball, including the Birmingham Barons of the Double-A Southern Association and the Vancouver Mounties and Seattle Rainiers of the Triple-A Pacific Coast League, through the end of the 1960 season. His first Major League job was as business manager of one of the first American League expansion teams, the Los Angeles Angels, whom he joined in their maiden season, 1961.

Seven years later, in 1968, Tallis was hired by Royals owner Ewing Kauffman to build his expansion team when it entered the AL in 1969. Tallis recruited a management team that included future GMs John Schuerholz, Lou Gorman, Syd Thrift, Jack McKeon and Herk Robinson. He drafted wisely in the 1968 AL Expansion Draft, supervised the founding and operation of the Kansas City Royals Baseball Academy, a revolutionary training ground for elite athletes without significant baseball experience, and built a strong farm system. By 1971, their third season, the Royals sported a winning record—earning Tallis the Executive of the Year Award from The Sporting News that season. Two years later, the Royals moved into a state-of-the-art new ballpark, now called Kauffman Stadium.

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