MLB Stadium Saga: Oakland/Tampa Bay/Southside

[Walk-Off]

I would argue that John Fisher and his allies across both the A's organization and MLB in general have themselves been creating problems in search of solutions, and thus forcing "gymnastic" ideas to be put into play, ever since Fisher et al. decided last spring to bail on Howard Terminal and instead go full speed ahead on what has become an increasingly convoluted effort to move the A's to the Las Vegas market.

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

2 minutes ago, Walk-Off said:

I would argue that John Fisher and his allies across both the A's organization and MLB in general have themselves been creating problems in search of solutions, and thus forcing "gymnastic" ideas to be put into play, ever since Fisher et al. decided last spring to bail on Howard Terminal and instead go full speed ahead on what has become an increasingly convoluted effort to move the A's to the Las Vegas market.

 

Also, this guy could have agreed to sell the A's to Joe Lacob, who was willing to buy the team. Then he could have taken his one billion dollars of profit as compared to his purchase price, and could have used that to get an expansion team for Las Vegas.

[McCall]

33 minutes ago, Walk-Off said:

For several months now, I have been thinking that the A's might very well suspend operations between their final season in Oakland and whenever a new ballpark for them in the Las Vegas area is open.  Playing a few more seasons in Oakland is likely to come with too many strings attached for the A's and/or MLB to accept.  Crashing at Oracle Park for a few years might constrain the Giants too much.  Going straight to the Aviators' ballpark for the interim seasons risks giving off the worst possible first impression of the A's to people in the Las Vegas market.  Finally, playing temporarily at a minor-league venue that is in neither the Bay Area nor Southern Nevada (such as in Sacramento or Salt Lake City) comes with a high possibility of the locals being reluctant to support what would be a fly-by-night enterprise in their area.

 

As for how the MLBPA could be sold on letting the A's go on hiatus for a few years, I think that the answer lies in MLB staying at 30 teams by granting a single expansion franchise that would launch right when the A's start their hiatus.  MLB could put the A's players through a dispersal draft open to all existing MLB clubs in addition to holding an expansion draft to stock the new team.  With regard to the minor-league affiliates of the A's, either the expansion team could inherit the A's farm system outright or MLB could order or at least allow a reshuffling of minor-league team affiliations.  Finally, once the A's are ready to start life anew as a Las Vegas team, then MLB can grow to 32 clubs by having another expansion franchise debut alongside the revival and relocation of the A's.

Where would said expansion team play? The only MLB-"level" stadiums that exist outside of MLB is Olympic Stadium in Montreal and soon the Oakland Coliseum. Any other market would require new stadium construction similar to the time frame of the LV ballpark, which renders the proposed solution moot.

[Walk-Off]

When John Fisher and other A's officials visited the Salt Lake City area recently, what they were at least rumored to explore was the A's playing temporarily not at Smith's Ballpark, the Bees' current home, but rather at the presently-under-constuction future home of the Bees in one of SLC's southern suburbs.

 

What I was thinking, then, was that this expedited expansion MLB team would be awarded to Big League Utah -- which seems to be the best-capitalized of the groups vying publicly for an MLB team in a currently MLB-free area (in other words, more flush with cash than the Portland Diamond Project or the Music City Baseball group in Nashville) -- and would play its first few seasons at that suburban facility intended originally for the Bees while a permanent home for the team in SLC's Power District undergoes an expedited construction.

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

36 minutes ago, McCall said:

The only MLB-"level" stadiums that exist outside of MLB is Olympic Stadium in Montreal and soon the Oakland Coliseum.

 

There's also the New Orleans Superdome, which has been renovated recently.  Of a similar size is the Alamodome; both stadiums seat more than 50,000 for baseball — not that that sort of crowd is going to be a concern of the A's.  

 

More to the A's level, we've seen Major League teams in temporary homes in San Juan and Buffalo that seat around 18,000. 

 

I think that this idea of the team going dark for a few years is very unlikely to happen.

[OnWis97]

MLB is major sports league most reliant on having an even number of teams. I cannot imagine several years of an odd number. 

It's fun to play out the scenarios. Is every "A's" game just a forfeit win for the "opponent?"  Do we just use winning percentage with uneven numbers of games played? Does the schedule get 100% balanced so every team  (within each league) has the same number of byes?

I really don't see this happening. It's bad for everyone. Lost home games for other teams, lost ability for the A's to come into Vegas as a competent team, lost MLB roster spots. 

 

I'd say they'll probably have an OKC Hornets situation in Salt Lake City or somewhere. If not that, the options are to play outdoors in the Vegas heat, several lame-duck years in Oakland, or being a 100% road team.

[McCall]

1 hour ago, Walk-Off said:

When John Fisher and other A's officials visited the Salt Lake City area recently, what they were at least rumored to explore was the A's playing temporarily not at Smith's Ballpark, the Bees' current home, but rather at the presently-under-constuction future home of the Bees in one of SLC's southern suburbs.

 

What I was thinking, then, was that this expedited expansion MLB team would be awarded to Big League Utah -- which seems to be the best-capitalized of the groups vying publicly for an MLB team in a currently MLB-free area (in other words, more flush with cash than the Portland Diamond Project or the Music City Baseball group in Nashville) -- and would play its first few seasons at that suburban facility intended originally for the Bees while a permanent home for the team in SLC's Power District undergoes an expedited construction.

This would only work if MLB wanted Salt Lake in the league in 2025. So far, there's no inkling that they view Salt Lake as anything other than a potential temporary home, much less a market they're ready to commit a team to as soon as next year. And if they only want to give them a trial run, then there's no need to make them any other team than the A's.

[McCall]

1 hour ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

 

There's also the New Orleans Superdome, which has been renovated recently.  Of a similar size is the Alamodome; both stadiums seat more than 50,000 for baseball — not that that sort of crowd is going to be a concern of the A's.  

 

More to the A's level, we've seen Major League teams in temporary homes in San Juan and Buffalo that seat around 18,000. 

 

I think that this idea of the team going dark for a few years is very unlikely to happen.

First off, no way in hell the Blue Jays would ever let another team use Buffalo, even on a temporary basis. It's their Triple-A team in a city they consider part of their market. Secondly, you can't fit a near-regulation baseball field in the Superdome or Alamodome. The Rangers played an exhibition game in the Alamodome about 10 years ago. The dimensions were fine for that, but not for a full-time team for a minimum of 3 years.

[gosioux76]

30 minutes ago, McCall said:

This would only work if MLB wanted Salt Lake in the league in 2025. So far, there's no inkling that they view Salt Lake as anything other than a potential temporary home, much less a market they're ready to commit a team to as soon as next year. 

 

That's exactly why Salt Lake is so willing to be a temporary host. The MLB may not want them now, but a year or two of performing as strong hosts of a vagabond MLB team would do a lot to change the minds of big-league brass. 

[McCall]

3 minutes ago, gosioux76 said:

 

That's exactly why Salt Lake is so willing to be a temporary host. The MLB may not want them now, but a year or two of performing as strong hosts of a vagabond MLB team would do a lot to change the minds of big-league brass. 

Yeah, which makes sense as a host for the A's, but not the "expansion team with the A's on hiatus" team. Otherwise, it's an expansion team that may be gone in a few years, rather than an established team where it's already known that they'll be in another city after that time.

[Ridleylash]

Really, if you're at the point where you're having to consider temporarily moving to a completely different state than the place you're actually trying to relocate to just so you can have a place to stay while you get a stadium built, you've officially reached boondoggle levels of planning.

 

Like, who in Utah is going to give a about a team that views them as nothing more than a stopgap because they don't have anywhere to play where they actually want to be? Literally the only reason the league approved this in the first place was a blind desire to rush into Vegas, and now Fisher seems to be tripping and bumbling pretty much every step to even get the A's there in the first place.

[Walk-Off]

56 minutes ago, McCall said:

Yeah, which makes sense as a host for the A's, but not the "expansion team with the A's on hiatus" team. Otherwise, it's an expansion team that may be gone in a few years, rather than an established team where it's already known that they'll be in another city after that time.

 

To be fair and to be clear, my idea is that an MLB expansion team starting up during a hiatus of the A's would keep playing -- and, preferably, keep playing in its original geographic area -- well after a relaunch of the A's as a Las Vegas club and the debut of another expansion franchise that together bring MLB up to 32 teams.  In short, I am proposing a two-step, asymmetrical expansion of MLB.

 

I realize that my overarching idea is complex.  Then again, John Fisher, his underlings, and the MLB establishment have been entertaining an increasingly complex relocation of the A's, so, in that sense, what I am proposing would be all too fitting.

[GDAWG]

A's going on hiatus isn't happening, or at least the MLBPA won't allow it to happen.  For obvious reasons they want to keep the A's, and I can see management of the MLBPA also touring Sacramento and Utah.  Where the A's play from 2025-2027 will also involve the union.  Not having them involved could cause some problems.  

[McCall]

14 minutes ago, Walk-Off said:

 

To be fair and to be clear, my idea is that an MLB expansion team starting up during a hiatus of the A's would keep playing -- and, preferably, keep playing in its original geographic area -- well after a relaunch of the A's as a Las Vegas club and the debut of another expansion franchise that together bring MLB up to 32 teams.  In short, I am proposing a two-step, asymmetrical expansion of MLB.

 

I realize that my overarching idea is complex.  Then again, John Fisher, his underlings, and the MLB establishment have been entertaining an increasingly complex relocation of the A's, so, in that sense, what I am proposing would be all too fitting.

That's my point. Your plan calls for an expansion team to begin next year, in 2025. There is no market long term expansion-ready that quickly. The time it would take a market to be expansion ready would take about as long as the construction of the Vegas ballpark. Therefore, any market that would be expanded to and use whatever infrastructure already in place, would not be any different than the A's playing there temporarily. The A's playing there would actually better work as a test case without the guarantee of a long term commitment that an expansion team would. Which, again, would be greatly hampered by the short amount of time.

[gosioux76]

3 hours ago, Ridleylash said:

Like, who in Utah is going to give a about a team that views them as nothing more than a stopgap because they don't have anywhere to play where they actually want to be?

 

 I don't understand this sentiment at all. 

 

If I'm a baseball fan in a market without its own team and suddenly I learn that one's going to play there, albeit temporarily, I'd be beyond excited. I'd go to as many games as possible because it's a helluva lot easier than taking a flight or planning a road trip to Denver, Phoenix, Seattle or San Francisco, which would be the closest MLB cities from SLC. 

 

That's just accounting for the convenience of it all. Now say you're a city, like SLC, that thinks it's big enough and deserves to be a big-league city. In addition to being a baseball fan who is excited to see some games played locally,  you've added a component of civic pride to the equation. It's even more powerful if you think going to those games, and showcasing that civic pride, increases the chances of getting your own team full-time. 

 

If you're SLC, there's absolutely ZERO risk in this and all upside. 

[Sec19Row53]

48 minutes ago, McCall said:

That's my point. Your plan calls for an expansion team to begin next year, in 2025. There is no market long term expansion-ready that quickly. The time it would take a market to be expansion ready would take about as long as the construction of the Vegas ballpark. Therefore, any market that would be expanded to and use whatever infrastructure already in place, would not be any different than the A's playing there temporarily. The A's playing there would actually better work as a test case without the guarantee of a long term commitment that an expansion team would. Which, again, would be greatly hampered by the short amount of time.

If this were pitched in the Arena Football thread, we'd all say 'yep, that sounds totally like Arena Football to pull something like this.

[B-Rich]

5 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

There's also the New Orleans Superdome, which has been renovated recently.  Of a similar size is the Alamodome; both stadiums seat more than 50,000 for baseball...

 

4 hours ago, McCall said:

Secondly, you can't fit a near-regulation baseball field in the Superdome...

 

The Superdome WAS originally configured to hold both baseball and football:

 

It held a lot of baseball games (MLB exhibition, college, etc.-- I saw a lot of them over the years). A three game exhibition series in 1980 averaged 25,000 a game and had 45,000 the first night.  Some Tulane-LSU matchups were well-attended.

 

However, the recent renovations Ferd noted have precluded any further baseball being played in the Superdome.  The lower sideline sections, which were once movable to create  a square/diamond shape, have  been made permanent, with bunker clubs underneath the stands  and wider concourses at the top.

The rectangle can no longer become a square.  

[DustDevil61]

1 hour ago, gosioux76 said:

 

 I don't understand this sentiment at all. 

 

If I'm a baseball fan in a market without its own team and suddenly I learn that one's going to play there, albeit temporarily, I'd be beyond excited. I'd go to as many games as possible because it's a helluva lot easier than taking a flight or planning a road trip to Denver, Phoenix Seattle or San Francisco, which would be the closest MLB cities from SLC. 

 

That's just accounting for the convenience of it all. Now say you're a city, like SLC, that thinks it's big enough and deserves to be a big-league city. In addition to being a baseball fan who is excited to see some games played locally,  you've added a component of civic pride to the equation. It's even more powerful if you think going to those games, and showcasing that civic pride, increases the chances of getting your own team full-time. 

 

If you're SLC, there's absolutely ZERO risk in this and all upside. 

With the recent chatter in the news about putting the A’s on hiatus until their Las Vegas stadium is done, and some comments on here about a temporary team to fill in the gap, it honestly wouldn’t surprise me if MLB pushed Fisher to sell the A’s to Big League Utah while granting him an all-new expansion team in Vegas. Obviously SLC would need to figure out funding for the MLB stadium, but they almost seem to have a better plan there than Vegas at the moment.

Salt Lake gets their team and Vegas gets time to figure out their stadium/funding, getting a new team of their own. No one goes on hiatus (unless Fisher wants the A’s brand/records and wants to do some form of Browns/Ravens situation).

 

Edited February 1 by DustDevil61
Browns/Ravens situation, no true hiatus

[The_Admiral]

Seems like Salt Lake City and Las Vegas should both be expansion locations while keeping the A's in Oakland. What a completely embarrassing situation. 

[McCall]

I have seen nothing from MLB that indicates Salt Lake is getting any team, other than the A's, potentially, on a temporary basis. Seems like everybody thinks that because they're being looked at as possible home until the Vegas ballpark is done, and I guess couple with Ryan Smith's intended desires to get an NHL expansion team, it means they've jumped the expansion list. Even IF the A's stayed in Oakland (it's not happening), Nashville would be much more desirable, along with Las Vegas, than Salt Lake.