Beane calls Athletics' pursuit of Encarnacion 'a lot of fun'

Oakland Athletics executive VP of baseball operations Billy Beane felt the thrill of venturing back into the high-profile free-agent waters earlier this week when his club was in the thick of negotiations with slugger Edwin Encarnacion.

"The fact that when it came down to the end, we did give it our best shot," Beane told Joe Stiglich of CSN Bay Area. "We just lost out at the end. The process was a lot of fun because those are not guys we've been in on the last few years."

Encarnacion agreed to a contract with the Cleveland Indians on Thursday reportedly worth $60 million over three years. The deal was actually less money annually than the two-year, $50-million offer the Athletics extended. Encarnacion's decision was largely based on geography, as he preferred not to sign on the west coast.

"We sort of saw this as a unique opportunity with a premium free agent still out there," Beane said. "We knew we'd face some headwinds going in, one being he was very much attached to staying closer to the east coast. But again, we saw this as a unique player, somebody that despite the fact that we're trying to develop a young team, we thought was that type of player who would have served as a real good anchor point with our young pitching and some of our other young players."

Two seasons removed from three straight postseason berths, the Athletics have been in rebuild mode and have made headlines recently for trying to ship players away, rather than attract them.

While the Athletics may not be as aggressive on the remaining free-agent bats on the market, Beane did hint that the club does have some money to spend.

"It's a new ownership structure," Beane said. "I thought it was really positive the way it worked internally."