O’Malley died from complications related to sepsis while receiving hospice care in Santa Barbara, his father told The Associated Press. He had become ill while traveling for business in New York last fall and later returned to Los Angeles for additional medical care as his condition declined.
Born and raised in Los Angeles, Kevin O’Malley grew up surrounded by baseball history. His grandfather, Walter O’Malley, owned the Dodgers from 1944 to 1979 and was later inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame for his role in helping bring Major League Baseball to the West Coast. His father, Peter O’Malley, served as Dodgers president from 1970 to 1998.
O’Malley followed his family’s baseball legacy, working in the Dodgers organization in the late 1990s with the Great Falls team in Montana and at Dodgertown in Vero Beach, Florida. He later became co-founder and owner of Top of the Third Inc., a company that operated minor league baseball teams including the Stockton Mudville Nine and the Visalia Rawhide in Central California.
In 2012, O’Malley became a part-owner of the San Diego Padres alongside members of the Seidler and O’Malley families. The ownership group later sold the team in April. His father remembered him as someone who valued both baseball and family, saying, “Baseball was important to him. Family came first, but baseball was a close second.”
Outside of baseball, O’Malley was also the founder and managing partner of Carmelina Capital Partners, a growth equity firm established in 2010. He played baseball during his time at Harvard-Westlake School and the University of Pennsylvania and earned an MBA from The Wharton School at Penn in 2004.
Kevin O’Malley is survived by his wife Allison, children Grace, Brendan, Brooke and Margaret, his sister Katherine, brother Brian, two nieces and two nephews. He was preceded in death by his mother, Annette.
The baseball community and those who knew Kevin O’Malley continue to remember him for his contributions to the sport, his dedication to family, and his lasting impact on baseball organizations in California. His legacy will remain connected to generations of the O’Malley family’s history in the game. May he rest in peace.