THEY'RE OUT!
The Oakland A's, after 56 years, officially will vacate the Coliseum at the end of the season and head to a minor-league park in Sacramento before Las Vegas move
This season will be the A's last in Oakland, after all.
Following years of overtures to play in other cities, the A's said Thursday that starting in 2025 they will play for three years, with the option of a fourth, at the Sacramento home of the River Cats, a Triple-A affiliate of the San Francisco Giants.
The team will ditch the 63,000-seat Coliseum, its home of five decades, at the end of this season and move to Sutter Health Park, a minor-league stadium with a capacity of 14,000, a quarter of which is open seating on an outfield lawn.
There is no lease agreement, and the A's won't pay a dime in rent to play in Sacramento.
But the team will still spend some money, partnering with the River Cats to add more seats and upgrade the batting cages, weight rooms and the field itself, among other facility improvements and paid advertising campaigns, team president Dave Kaval said in an interview.
“It's a bittersweet day,” Kaval said. “Obviously, 56 years in Oakland — it's been a historic run, so many great memories.”
The A's will not use branding for either city during their stay in Sacramento — their home and road jerseys will simply read “Athletics”.
The A's, who moved to Oakland from Kansas City in 1968, expect to open a new ballpark on the Las Vegas Strip in 2028 to complete their relocation there, though they have not broken ground as construction contracts have not yet been signed.
The news of a pending deal was first reported Wednesday night by Sacramento radio host Dave Weiglein after the team on Tuesday met with officials in Oakland and Alameda County and the next day with Sacramento representatives.
Kaval said Thursday that the two sides remained “far apart” by the end of negotiations, even after the city budged from its public offer of a $97 million lease over five years. If the team left after three years for the Vegas ballpark, it would still be expected to pay the full amount.
“It wasn't a market-rate offer,” he said, and representatives for Mayor Sheng Thao agreed: The price, they noted, was an “exit fee” to generate revenue against Oakland's ongoing budget shortfall.
On Tuesday night, the may
or's chief of staff called Kaval with another offer: a $ 60 million lease over three years, but with a hard condition that Major League Baseball begins working to bring an expansion team to the city.
Kaval, known for his Aviator sunglasses and stretchy smile, had become the grinning face of the A's deteriorating relationship with Oakland, often facing the public instead of owner John Fisher.
The two have blamed the city of Oakland for not backing the team in its quest to build a ballpark and thousands of units of housing at Howard Terminal on the city's waterfront.
The pair also had talks with Salt Lake City officials about playing there while the Vegas stadium is built — a development that already has faced several legal and logistical hurdles.
In a statement posted to the A's website, Fisher said the “conditions to achieve an agreement” in Oakland “seemed out of reach” despite “good intentions on all sides in the negotiations.”
“We understand the disappointment this news brings to our fans, as this season marks our final one in Oakland,” the owner said. “Throughout this season, we will honor and celebrate our time in Oakland, and will share additional details soon.”
The mayor's office, meanwhile, appeared ready to bid farewell to the franchise, maintaining that it moved mountains to gather the public funding necessary to back a waterfront stadium and housing development — a deal that fell through last spring.
“Oakland offered a deal that was fair to the A's and was fiscally responsible for our city,” Thao said in a statement.
Despite lease extension talks falling through, the A's remain interested in offloading their half share of the Coliseum property, acquired in 2019, to the AfricanAmerican Sports and Entertainment Group, a coalition of developers and investors led by Oakland native Ray Bobbitt.
Before hurrying to West Sacramento for an introductory news conference, Kaval on Thursday morning attended a conference call with the development group, telling this news organization that the A's still have every intention to sell.
Moving northeast to the state's capital will keep the A's within driving range of Oakland, allowing fans who remain loyal to continue attending games while the Vegas stadium is constructed.
Sacramento, meanwhile, can now audition for what the city has always coveted, according to one sports economist: another major professional franchise to pair with the NBA's Kings.
“It's a market that's probably not as unhappy with Fisher as Oakland,” said Nola Agha, a University of San Francisco professor who studies stadium construction and previously wrote an analysis of the A's development plans at Howard Terminal. “It's a rational move for the A's to remain nearby. Whether it pays off, we'll see.”
Sutter Health Park, with its 10,000 seats and outdoor lawn area, is a far cry from the 63,000- seat Coliseum, where the A's have at times tarped off the upper deck due to low attendance. The A's finished last in MLB in attendance the past two seasons.
The A's began this season with a dreadful homestand, going 1- 6 with MLB's second- worst run differential at minus- 29. After a series of road games, they will return April 12 against the Washington Nationals, the first of 74 remaining games in Oakland.
In an email, former River Cats representative Gabe Ross said in 2006 that the Sacramento park was constructed with only minorleague baseball in mind and “would need significant adjustments” for MLB.
The MLB Players Association cannot outright veto a relocation but has the power to negotiate on the working conditions of a new home park.
Agha noted that over the past four decades, major professional sports teams have actively sought smaller stadiums to create a perception of scarcity among ticket- buyers and establish “gravitas and the illusion of excitement in a crowd.”
“The place is so intimate and close to the action,” Kaval said. “I think it's going to be very appealing to fans in Sacramento.”
A major complication for the A's in leaving Oakland had been their local broadcast contract with NBC Sports, which reportedly pays them $ 67 million in annual revenue. By moving to Sacramento, where the team's games were already broadcast, the A's will retain a version of the same deal, said Kaval, who declined to provide specifics.
For much of the A's run at the Coliseum, ownership has sought relocation, stretching as far back as 1970 when owner Charlie Finley reportedly had discussions about moving the team to Toronto. Later came Chicago, Denver and the South Bay — whether San Jose or Fremont.
Now, that ambition will become reality, and the A's will become the third majorleague team since 2019 to leave Oakland.