Stadium/Arena Saga Omnibus

[SCMODS]

The A's triple-A team, the Aviators play right there in Sumerlin. Vegas baseball fans should have a tiny bit of familiarity with the A's. 

[gosioux76]

6 minutes ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

Also, any talk about changing the team's name is downright offensive. Civilisation needs to be protected from baseball "fans" who openly declare that they don't care about history. The move of the team is sickening enough; but trashing the team's long history would be compounding the crime.

 

If anything, the A's are the perfect team for Las Vegas. Professional sports' most transient team representing a city built to serve the transient consumer. More reason to keep the name. 

[LMU]

The real winner in this whole scenario may be Fresno.  If Summerlin is taken over then they'll potentially be right back up in AAA after being swatted down to Low-A after the whole minor league reshuffle.

[BadSeed84]

19 minutes ago, the admiral said:

Crime is up everywhere, the entire country is going to hell in a bucket.

 

Mostly in big cities though.

[McCall]

18 minutes ago, LMU said:

The real winner in this whole scenario may be Fresno.  If Summerlin is taken over then they'll potentially be right back up in AAA after being swatted down to Low-A after the whole minor league reshuffle.

Unless they let them keep their Triple-A team in Summerlin.

Another option would be for them to let the Aviators stay, but they drop down to the California League, as the A's affiliate, with Fresno going up.

[Walk-Off]

1 hour ago, LMU said:

The real winner in this whole scenario may be Fresno.  If Summerlin is taken over then they'll potentially be right back up in AAA after being swatted down to Low-A after the whole minor league reshuffle.

 

As nice as it might be for Fresno to regain Class AAA professional baseball, another likely scenario is that the A's and the Aviators not only coexist in the Las Vegas market in general over the long term (just like the Atlanta Braves and the Gwinnett Stripers, the Houston Astros and the Sugar Land Space Cowboys, the Minnesota Twins (of Minneapolis) and the St. Paul Saints, or the Seattle Mariners and the Tacoma Rainiers), but also even play at the same ballpark in Summerlin while the big-league club's new venue is under construction.  I lived near Nashville when a now-demolished ballpark in that city hosted both the established Class AAA Sounds and a temporary Class AA team nicknamed the Xpress for two seasons, so I know that the A's and the Aviators would have at least one model for pulling off a similar situation.

[OnWis97]

59 minutes ago, MiK said:

The thing about Vegas is the draw of away-game fans. Is that a sustainable business model? No. But it's definitely a bigger factor there than most other markets.

I want to see all the MLB ballarks. But I'm not planning a July trip to Vegas to do so. (There's a reason that I haven't been to a D-backs game or games of Texas or Florida teams).

 

I guess people travel there year-round though.

 

Is there data about visiting team fandom for the Golden Knights?

[MiK]

43 minutes ago, BBTV said:

 

I don't think a significant amount of people are going to plan a trip to LV to sit and watch some run-of-the-mill Tuesday game between the Rolling Bones and Cleveland Guardians.

 

Not stadium-filling numbers, no. But I'd argue more away fans are drawn to Vegas than say Milwaukee or Cleveland on a Tuesday game. Just saying, their ticket sales to away fans will be higher than most. Revenue is revenue.

 

26 minutes ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

It's true that no one is going to make a trip to Las Vegas to see an A's game

 

No one makes a trip to Oakland to see an A's game 

[Digby]

It is strange to me to have the Oakland exodus on the heels of Oakland becoming cool and kinda gentrified, since you have to be either a multi-millionaire or homeless to exist in SF (no in-between). But I guess it only got gentrified to middle-class and it’s multi-millionaire to get you a new stadium. Kind of a shame to lose a distinctive sporting culture, but also that ship sailed as soon as the Warriors got good / villainous enough to attract the tech bros.

 

Also it's like people had no idea the Tenderloin existed before they saw videos on TikTok.

[MiK]

13 minutes ago, OnWis97 said:

Is there data about visiting team fandom for the Golden Knights?

 

Not that I know of, I'd be very curious to know. Especially considering their early success and how that impacted local sales from what was 'expected'. It's a unique set of circumstances for that franchise. At some point, the Knights will have a bad season and it will be interesting to see the impact that has on attendance.

 

On the Raiders side of things, it's been voiced about the number of opposing fans in Vegas. But like BBTV said, people plan trips well in advance for football games. Not really a fair comparison.

Edited April 20, 2023 by MiK
Reworded

[Rockstar Matt]

3 hours ago, heavybass said:

The City mostly, they tried to get the A's to fund the refurbishment of the stadium... team was like that wasn't part of the deal and basically both sides aren't heroes in this.

 

Billionaires should build and fund their own stadiums, not the taxpayers (*cough* Spanos, *cough). Make no mistake, the A's owner could have refurbished the Coliseum when they purchased the franchise back in '05 and in the years since, but hasn't done so purely because he's trying to earn the maximum profit possible from his ownership.

[WestCoastBias]

59 minutes ago, Walk-Off said:

 

As nice as it might be for Fresno to regain Class AAA professional baseball, another likely scenario is that the A's and the Aviators not only coexist in the Las Vegas market in general over the long term (just like the Atlanta Braves and the Gwinnett Stripers, the Houston Astros and the Sugar Land Space Cowboys, the Minnesota Twins (of Minneapolis) and the St. Paul Saints, or the Seattle Mariners and the Tacoma Rainiers), but also even play at the same ballpark in Summerlin while the big-league club's new venue is under construction.  I lived near Nashville when a now-demolished ballpark in that city hosted both the established Class AAA Sounds and a temporary Class AA team nicknamed the Xpress for two seasons, so I know that the A's and the Aviators would have at least one model for pulling off a similar situation.

 

MLB really did Fresno dirty with taking away their Triple-A team after the MiLB reshuffling. The fans went from watching future stars (all of the World Series Giants and a lot of the World Series Astros) to Low-A scrubs in an empty 10,000 stadium. To stop Fresno from suing them MLB guaranteed a MiLB through 2030 but did not guarantee a future Triple-A team, only saying they'd recommend Fresno as a Triple-A option in the future but that's it. 

 

I also don't see how Vegas can (or why they should) support a Triple-A team and an MLB team. 

[BBTV]

The new rules definitely benefit Las Vegas, since people may be more likely to take 2:30 out of their time to go see a game then get back to whatever else they're doing, rather than go from some fast-paced vacation to go sit through a 4-hour snooze fest then get back to whatever they're dong.

[Bmac]

With all the entertainment options in Vegas, I just can't imagine many folks flocking to see a poorly run franchise play a meaningless baseball game on a daily basis. It's going to be a nearly empty stadium most of the time. Another Marlins Park situation.

[WestCoastBias]

Portland A's would have been better than the Las Vegas A's

[gosioux76]

15 minutes ago, Bmac said:

With all the entertainment options in Vegas, I just can't imagine many folks flocking to see a poorly run franchise play a meaningless baseball game on a daily basis. It's going to be a nearly empty stadium most of the time. Another Marlins Park situation.

 

Maybe, but baseball — especially, as @BBTVnoted, with shorter run times — can be more like an impulse purchase as opposed to the reason for being there. Compared with the NHL of NFL, the tickets are cheap and accessible, so someone could just decide to take a flier and take in a game, knowing it'll only take 2 1/2 hours out of their day. 

[BBTV]

12 minutes ago, Bmac said:

With all the entertainment options in Vegas, I just can't imagine many folks flocking to see a poorly run franchise play a meaningless baseball game on a daily basis. It's going to be a nearly empty stadium most of the time. Another Marlins Park situation.

 

Being in LV might help them attract free agents.  Not necessarily because of the "action", but there's a growing number of players from the LV area that may want to sign with a cash-infused hometown team.

[BBTV]

1 minute ago, gosioux76 said:

 

Maybe, but baseball — especially, as @Gothamite noted, with shorter run times — can be more like an impulse purchase as opposed to the reason for being there. Compared with the NHL of NFL, the tickets are cheap and accessible, so someone could just decide to take a flier and take in a game, knowing it'll only take 2 1/2 hours out of their day. 

 

This is like the third time in the past few days you've referred to me as Gothamite, who hasn't been around here forever.  'Sup with that?

[gosioux76]

Just now, BBTV said:

 

This is like the third time in the past few days you've referred to me as Gothamite, who hasn't been around here forever.  'Sup with that?

Huh. Not sure why. My apologies. 

[WestCoastBias]

2 minutes ago, BBTV said:

 

Being in LV might help them attract free agents.  Not necessarily because of the "action", but there's a growing number of players from the LV area that may want to sign with a cash-infused hometown team.

 

Too bad for them that Kris Bryant (he's not good anymore anyway) and Bryce Harper are already locked for this entire decade. They'll have to settle for Joey Gallo.