Lucinda Kinau Treat never liked baseball as a kid growing up in Redskins-obsessed Washington, D.C. She liked sports–swimming, soccer, tennis–just not baseball. That changed soon after she joined Shearman & Sterling as a first-year associate in April 1997. There she helped one of the firm's clients, John Henry, buy the Florida Marlins in 1998. Henry was so impressed with the 28-year-old M&A lawyer that he asked her to become the team's general counsel.

Within three years, though, Henry had his sights set on buying the most coveted team in sports–the Boston Red Sox. A number of investors made a run for the team in a 2001 auction, and Henry's group won with a mind-boggling $660 million bid. Henry quickly sold off the Marlins and relocated Treat to Boston to serve as the team's new chief legal officer. With Treat's assistance, Henry and his partners then went to work renovating Fenway and assembling a team that could compete with the

ber-rich and -talented New York Yankees.