As Ewing Kauffman began dabbling in the notion of trying to secure an expansion baseball team for Kansas City, an idea that would be hatched with its first game 50 years ago this week, he turned to Angels owner Gene Autry to get a sense of all that might be entailed in the endeavor.
In the process, Autry funneled him to vice president of operations Cedric Tallis, with whom Kauffman became so taken that Tallis soon accompanied him to Mexico City as an adviser for the 1967 baseball owners’ meetings that led to Kauffman being awarded a franchise on Jan.