MLB Commissioner Manfred blames Oakland for losing A’s to Las Vegas
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A day after the Oakland Athletics virtually punched their ticket for a one-way trip to Las Vegas, failing to make good on their rooted-in-Oakland pledge, Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred addressed the relocation process by providing what might be seen at best as revisionist history while claiming sympathy for A’s fans.
While Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo was preparing Thursday to sign a bill calling for $380 million in public funding for a 30,000-seat ballpark on the Las Vegas Strip, A’s fans mourned the pending loss of a franchise that has been in the East Bay since 1968.
Manfred spoke from MLB’s New York’s offices on the final day of the owners’ meetings. Though no relocation vote was taken, they could give their approval in a conference call — 75% of the 30 owners is required to make it official, and there’s zero indication the owners, fed up with the A’s long-running stadium dilemma, won’t give their authorization in a one-sided vote.
“There’s some work that needs to be done. I’m not going to predict a timeline on that,” Manfred said.
Before the vote, the A’s must submit a relocation application to a Manfred-appointed committee that would make a recommendation to the owners.
“It has always been baseball’s policy and preference to stay put,” Manfred said. “I think that always colors any conversation about relocation. Having said that, I think the owners as a whole understand that there has been a multiyear, pushing a decade, effort where for the vast majority of the time, the sole focus was Oakland.”
Manfred tried to place blame on Oakland for the A’s relocating, claiming the city lacked an offer, site and plan for a new ballpark. That claim conflicts with the actions taken by Bay Area political leaders and policymakers in recent months and years as the team and city focused on constructing at Howard Terminal and negotiating a deal to develop the waterfront site.
“I hear from ’em. I feel sorry for the fans in Oakland. I do not like this outcome. I understand why they feel the way they do,” Manfred said. “I think the real question is, what is it Oakland was prepared to do? There is no Oakland offer, OK? They never got to a point where they had a plan to build a stadium at any site. And it’s not just John Fisher. You don’t build a stadium based on the club activity alone. The community has to provide support, and at some point, you come to the realization it’s just not going to happen.”
Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao’s office quickly noted Manfred’s claims were “just totally false” and explained the extent of negotiations regarding Howard Terminal.
The commissioner’s stance is far different than it was in July 2018 when he said at a Baseball Writers’ Association of America luncheon, “I believe that there is not another market in the United States that has the upside potential that Oakland has, and I think we would regret leaving Oakland if we did that.”
Manfred doubled down on his preference not to charge the A’s a relocation fee, which would be unusual in professional sports. He cited the projected $1.5 billion stadium that would require $1.1 billion in private financing from the A’s.
“For baseball to step in and have a relocation fee, I don’t see that a realistic possibility,” said Manfred, adding the final say on a relocation fee would come during the relocation process.
On Wednesday, the Nevada Legislature approved Senate Bill 1 calling for $380 million in public funding for a 30,000-seat ballpark on the Strip. The Nevada Assembly voted 25-15 to approve the bill after it initially got approval Tuesday from the Nevada Senate by a 13-8 count. With both chambers in agreement and achieving concurrence on several amendments, the bill went to Lombardo for his signature.
The A’s are moving from the country’s sixth-largest media market to the 40th, from a possible waterfront site to a site surrounded by casinos. Though many economists’ research and academic studies show show publicly financed sports venues don’t produce positive financial benefits, Manfred provided a different twist.
“I love academics, they’re great,” he said, deriding fact-based research on stadium impact. “You know, academics can say whatever they want. I think the reality tells you something else.”
Asked by reporters about A’s fans’ future allegiances, Manfred said, “I hope that they stay baseball fans, whatever they decide to affiliate with.”
Manfred said he was out to dinner and didn’t watch Tuesday night’s Rays-A’s game at the Coliseum attended by a season-high 27,759 fans who organized their reverse boycott with a T-shirt giveaway — reading “SELL” across the front — and orchestrated chants calling for Fisher to sell the team to investors who would keep it in Oakland.
While referring to the event as a “great thing,” Manfred derided the fans’ initiative by calling it “almost an average Major League Baseball crowd in the facility for one night.”
Chronicle staff writer Sarah Ravani contributed to this report.
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
