Before getting to this blog, if you'd like to read my column on Giants managing general partner Bill Neukom click here. 

Here is a transcript of the interview I did May 26 with Giants managing general partner Bill Neukom. My column on Neukom was originally scheduled for Sunday but will run instead on Monday, June 1. The early part of this interview is about his biography; later he gets into baseball matters.

Q: What were the names of your parents and what did they do?

A: John and Ruth. Dad worked for McKinsey and Company, managed their San Francisco office and for quite a while the Los Angeles office as well and Mom raised a family of four kids and did a lot of volunteer work for the church and Planned Parenthood, American Association of University Women, associations like that. McKinsey and Company are management consultants, a global entity these days. Dad came out in 1946 after WWII to set up Mckinsey's first West Coast office here in San Francisco.

Q: Where did you grow up?

A: We grew up right down by El Camino in San Mateo. Out of our back gate you could walk to Burlingame. That's where we went for groceries and baseball cards. It was closer to us than downtown San Mateo. We were just about a block from El Camino. Our house was two stories, a pretty big house because there were four of us kids. The best part about it was we were living next door to Charlie Graham. Charlie was the son of the owner of the San Francisco Seals. He had a wife and just one child, a tomboy daughter named Tina. She was a great baseball fan as you might imagine. She would invite us to baseball games, so we'd walk to the Greyhound depot there in Burlingame and get on the gray dog and go up to Seals Stadium and watch baseball games with her. That was 1946, I was 5 years old. My first real hero was Gene Woodling part of that amazing team of 1948. Lefty (O'Doul) taught him the crouch to make him see the ball better. Casey Stengel used to say "I like my kid Woodling in left field because it gets late early out there." He meant the shadows came in. Woodling played left field in the real Yankee Stadium - old Yankee Stadium better than anybody did. I also remember the day Babe Ruth died. I came home from school and strewn on the driveway of the Graham's house were bats and balls and hats and gloves and programs and playing cards, and it was Tina's homage to Babe Ruth spread out all over the driveway.

Q: What position did you play?

A: I played left field as a kid and I didn't play very long because I misspent a lot of my youth playing basketball. And then I played some softball as an adult and in soft ball I played first base.

Q: How did you get to Dartmouth?

A: My folks are both graduates of the University of Chicago and took pretty seriously higher education. We went on a tour as a family 1954 (to check out colleges for his sister), went back to Chicago and from there we got a car and drove up to show her Michigan State and Wisconsin. Went to Niagara Falls and came down through New England and saw some of the Seven Sister schools. There's a baseball story in this. First major league game I saw was in Wrigley Field 1954, June. Hank Sauer hit a home run that day. The tradition in Wrigley Field at least that year was when Hank hit a home run and would have to take his position in left field his fan club would shower him with pouches of chewing tobacco and he'd tuck them in the ivy and at the end of the half he'd gather them up in his glove and take them into the dugout where he could store them for use later. When it was my turn to apply to college - what do you know when you're barely 17? I picked Dartmouth because I liked its colors. Green and a white band. They had a terrific basketball player named Rudy LaRusso. He played with the Lakers opposite Elgin Baylor for years. I thought that's my school.

Q: Did you play basketball at Dartmouth?

A: I never played at Dartmouth. My senior year of high school I hurt my knee. I was a forward.

Q: What did you major in at Dartmouth?

A: Philosophy. The faculty appealed to me. They were such rigorous thinkers.

Q: Did philosophy help you be a lawyer.

A: I think it did because it's critical thinking. It's wallowing in a lot of information and trying to analyze it and come to rational and thoughtful conclusions.

Q: Did a particular philosopher appeal to you?

A: Hah. I sort of like the old guys. I love Plato and I love Socrates and I love Descartes.

Q: Why did you got to law school?

A: Kind of a sophomoric notion, just simple justice. I didn't like people who would treat other people unfairly. I didn't like systems that were unfair. I thought the law was a place where you could do some good and be part of a system that treated people fairly.

Q: It was an ethical impulse?

A: It was, I think. Part of it was the example my parents set. Neither of them was a minister or a rabbi or a priest but they had this sense of fair play. I think we have an obligation to make the world a better place.

Q: You still feel that way?

A: I do, absolutely. I do.

Q: How did working at Microsoft help to form you as an adult?

A: It was an amazing opportunity. I'm indebted to Bill Gates' dad for giving me a chance to represent that company when it first came up to the Northwest when it was a tiny little company. I'm indebted to his son for sticking with me. Some of it was on-the-job training. I was not a corporate lawyer when this came up. I grew with the company. There are thousands and thousands of lawyers who could have done the job I did. I was just very lucky to be the guy there at the time when they needed somebody and to be part of a company that changed the way people learn and think. Part of the psychic compensation was - the company was so young and the people in it were so smart and so young sometimes it felt like part of what I did was to provide some adult supervision. Just providing a good sounding board a little bit of discipline a little bit of structure and ideas not just legal concepts but just some common sense how to run with this idea.

Q: Why do you wear a bow tie and dress so formally? Are you aware how you present yourself?

A: I don't think I'm very aware. Part of the fun of having a job in a city is you get to wear a coat and tie and I still enjoy that. I did it for years at Microsoft. I'm comfortable in a coat and tie and it's kind of fun. Gives me something to wake up to and think about. I don't do it for any effect. I just do it because it feels normal to me. It hadn't really occurred to me. People make jokes and comments about the bowtie. I don't dress for anybody else. I don't dress for effect. I feel comfortable in these types of clothes. That's why I wear them.

Q: Why do you lean against the batting cage during batting practice?

A: Just the fun of watching these amazing athletes go through these remarkable exercises. Seeing Shawon Dunston throw hard from 40 feet to Giants batters and what they do with it. Part of it is trying to see it through the batting coach's eyes or see it through the manager's eyes. Part of it's the fellowship of it. I don't want to be in anybody's way. I'm not a baseball guy as much as much as I love the game but I can't resist getting up close to it. I hope in a way I'm not very visible to the players but I also want the players and coaches to know this is a person who cares about what they're doing and who admires their craft and is there to support them just by being there. I learn by asking questions of the coaches. I think I can tell when somebody's swinging well. Juan Uribe is the best example. When Juan is having a good day in batting practice it's likely that carries over into a game. I also love watching infield. I am so appreciative of Bochy making the decision on his own midway through last year we have to start doing infield, we need more practice. I believe in terms of human conduct practice does make perfect. I love it when these guys take infield. I love the choreography and the discipline of it. I could watch infield and outfield and batting practice two hours every day. It's mesmerizing.

Q: What is your management style?

A: We'll establish a culture of merit. Whether you're responsible for the baseball press or whether you're selling sponsorships or season tickets or greeting people at their seats or you're raking the infield in this organization you should understand that if you perform well, if you work hard and smart and if you've got the skill set that matches your job you will achieve your potential. It's not about who you're related to or how many years you've been here and it's not about the color of your hair or your skin or your faith or your gender or your sexual orientation. It's how you perform that job. That's my philosophy of work; that's what the Giants Way is about.

Q: Why did you want to become the leader of this franchise?

A: Southerners have a great term. A man should never seek the office. The office should seek the man. I didn't seek this job. I was an investor for very simple reasons. I called the office to talk to Peter Magowan when I was down here on some work once. I was aware he was the lead owner at the time and there was a consortium that had shares of the Giants. I called him at home and he was very personable and we talked for 45 minutes about the Giants. I peeled off some of the windfall from Microsoft and bought an interest as a limited partner and over time other people wanted to leave the limited partnership or reduce their shares so I had a chance to be the utility infielder and pick up their shares and I increased my stake in the Giants. And then there came a time about six years ago it seemed a good thing to have an additional general partner. Peter was the managing general partner and Harmon Burns was the other general partner and they invited me to be a general partner and to help some with organization and communications because I knew something about how partnerships work. And when Peter decided to move forward they turned to me and said Harmon's not here and Sue (Burns) doesn't want to do it. Would you give this a try? I said sure. The timing wasn't great. I was completing my year as the American Bar Association president.

Q: Brian Sabean said he needs to trade for a power hitter. Can you explain?

A: This answer is elliptical. I don't mean it to be. We're always looking for hitters. First and foremost we're looking for hitters on our 25 and 40-man roster and in our farm system. We're trying to manage this thing in the medium and long term. You've heard us say the objective this year is to play winning baseball and that's not easy to go from just 72 wins to 82 wins. Will we click our heels and pop the champagne bottles if we win 82 games this year? No. But I'll be realistic about trying to manage a curve of success that starts with playing winning baseball and builds on that and does it in a way that we keep some powder dry for that occasional strategic free-agent signing or some trade or if we have to invest in an expensive draft choice. The answer is yes, that's how we're trying to manage this thing. If we were the Barry Giants and we needed Ellis Burks in right field that was the piece that would take us deep, that would be an easier decision to make. We're not that kind of a team. We're a team of 25 parts. If everybody on this 25-man roster does his job we'll do fine, we'll play winning baseball. So far that's not been the rule. We haven't had the leadership from some veterans we'd hoped for. We've had some mistakes from younger players we shouldn't have had to experience. I am not enamored of the home run for home run's sake. I don't care how we score runs. I'm not a big fan of small ball or smart ball call it what you will. I'm all in favor of energetic smart baseball when you move the runner over and score the run. Tom Seaver said to me this winter, "I'd rather give up a home run than a double. Because that guy who just took me to the wall is right behind me damn it and I've got to deal with him." I love doubles and I love run-scoring singles and I love moving the runner over. I don't care if we win 3-2. I don't care if we win 8-2. We have said this when people were all over us about it - "You've got to get Manny." We realized we didn't have the most powerful lineup coming into the season. Our analysis was that we had very good pitching and if we could catch the ball and play good defense we ought to generate enough runs to be a much better team this year than last year without shooting the moon and spending more than we want to and without putting frankly a lid on talent which we finally have some of in the farm system. Our plan is bring up homegrown talent. It's cheaper and they've been taught to play baseball the way it should be played and fans are attached to homegrown talent the way they never are to someone who comes in as a free agent. So there's every reason in the world to develop our farm system. We have neglected it for a while with good reason. I'm not second guessing that strategy. I was a part of it. You have Barry Bonds and you have the best ballpark in America you should have done what we did and we rode that horse as far as we could. We probably should have had a better transition plan, succession plan earlier than we had. But now we have some good draft picks. We better have some talent in our system because we had the picks to get them. Independent third party experts are saying the giants are in the top four or five farm systems in major league baseball. We did say to people when there was all this to-ing and fro-ing about you've got to get a big bat in the offseason, we said we're not panicked about that. We said we're going to play very exciting competitive baseball going in. You don't have to accept this but I think Manny Ramirez is an American League player. You've got to play defense. He can't catch a cold in the field. You've got to run the bases in the National League. This is not an easy left field here; it's a tough left field. We just didn't think he was a fit for us. If he'd fallen to us at a lot less money we would have sucked it up and taken the defensive liability that came with it. Get the slugger. Get the slugger. Who's the slugger? Short of spending $25 million on a Teixeira. But we did say to people, look in light of what happened to the economy in this world there may be some of our competitors who may be willing to give up some talent at the midseason because they can't afford it and they'll be somewhat desperate so we said to folks look it hasn't come together in the offseason for a bat. We don't think we're dependent on a big bat and I'm not sure we have the foundation where a big bat wins 15 more games for us. We'll take a look as we get into June and July and see if something's there, if someone - I won't say distress sale - but if somebody is available because of the economy and the finances of that franchise we think there's going to be more of a market place before the trade deadline than there has in past years because of the economy. Are we counting on that? No. I don't know what the odds are that we'll pick up somebody.