Connect with us

Published

on

ARLINGTON, Texas — Major League Baseball owners voted unanimously Thursday to allow the Oakland Athletics to move to Las Vegas, paving the way for the second relocation of a baseball team in the past half-century.

The potential move, which comes after more than two decades of failed efforts to secure a new stadium in the city to replace the aging Oakland Coliseum, needed backing from three-quarters of teams at the quarterly owners meetings. It received unanimous support despite unanswered questions about the team’s near-term future and stadium plans.

“Today is an incredibly difficult day for Oakland A’s fans,” Athletics owner John Fisher said. “It’s a great day for Las Vegas.”

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred echoed Fisher’s sentiments, saying: “I know — I know — this is a terrible day for fans in Oakland. I understand that. And that’s why we’ve always had a policy of doing everything humanly possible to avoid a relocation. And I truly believe we did that in this case. I think it’s beyond debate, that the status quo in Oakland was untenable. Those of you who have been in the building understand what I’m talking about. And I absolutely am convinced that there was not a viable path forward in Oakland.”

The move is not yet finalized. Legal challenges from a teachers union in Nevada regarding the $380 million the state has committed to the construction of a $1.5 billion stadium on the Las Vegas Strip still could scuttle the move, but winning approval from owners marks a significant step toward Oakland losing its last major men’s professional sports team.

Prior to the Montreal Expos moving to Washington, D.C., in 2005, the last MLB team to relocate was the Washington Senators, who became the Texas Rangers in 1972. The Athletics moved to Oakland from Kansas City in 1968 and have won four World Series in their 56 seasons in the city.

After announcing in 2021 plans to pursue a “parallel path” in which it would weigh stadium deals in Oakland and Las Vegas, the team chose Vegas in April 2023, with Manfred saying MLB would waive its relocation fee, estimated to be around $300 million.

The backlash from A’s fans was immediate and consistent. Chants of “sell the team” directed at Fisher — a Gap heir who bought the franchise in 2005 — served as background noise at most home games for the A’s, who went an MLB-worst 50-112 in 2023 and carried the league’s lowest payroll. More than 27,000 fans showed up in June for a so-called “reverse boycott,” during which they implored Fisher to sell.

After giving a short statement Thursday, Fisher left a news conference without taking questions.

Asked whether he considered Fisher a good owner, Manfred pointed to the A’s on-field success (seven playoff appearances since 2005), pegged the low payrolls (never higher than 18th in his 19 years owning the team) to the stadium’s poor conditions and said: “My answer is, over the long haul, yes, I think he’s been a good owner.”

In a letter sent to half the MLB owners last week, Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao said the city had procured $928 million in funding for a stadium and surrounding development and wanted to keep the team.

The Athletics’ lease with the Oakland Coliseum expires after the 2024 season, and the team has yet to solidify plans for where it will play before the Las Vegas stadium is ready in 2028. Manfred said extending the lease in Oakland is an option, though the city — which owns half the stadium, while the Athletics own the other half — has said in order to do so that it would need to keep the A’s name and move to the front of the line for a potential expansion franchise.

“We are disappointed by the outcome of this vote,” Thao said in a statement. “But we do not see this as the end of the road. We all know there is a long way to go before shovels in the ground and that there are a number of unresolved issues surrounding this move. I have also made it clear to the commissioner that the A’s branding and name should stay in Oakland and we will continue to work to pursue expansion opportunities. Baseball has a home in Oakland even if the A’s ownership relocates.”

The lack of a home for three seasons is far from the only reservation about the Athletics’ move. Not only would they be leaving for a smaller media market, but the team would also remain a revenue-sharing recipient, a point of contention in recent years. The new stadium, located at the site of the old Tropicana hotel, is slated to be built on a 9-acre parcel, which would be one of the smallest in MLB. While the A’s released renderings of a Las Vegas stadium, they did not include a dome or retractable roof, which would be necessary to combat the city’s summer heat.

Nonetheless, the vote received unfettered support after the league’s relocation committee championed it. Manfred adopted the recommendation, the league’s executive council voted unanimously to greenlight it, and the remainder of owners joined Thursday.

Uncertainty regarding the Athletics’ future had hung over the league since 2001, when the team first sought to build a new stadium. An attempt in 2005 to move to nearby Fremont fell apart, and efforts to pursue a stadium in San Jose were blocked by the San Francisco Giants, whose territorial rights extend to the southern part of the Bay Area.

Potential stadium plans in Oakland stalled, with the team and league blaming politicians and vice versa. The most promising deal was for a massive reimagining of Howard Terminal in the Port of Oakland, a 55-acre parcel that would have developed 6 million square feet of commercial buildings, residential units and a 35,000-seat stadium. The $12 billion price tag, however, proved too large, and Las Vegas — which already had taken the Raiders from Oakland in 2020 — swooped in to do the same with the A’s.

Securing public funding wasn’t easy. The A’s initially sought $500 million in public money. On June 14, the Nevada Senate passed a $380 million bill after the A’s agreed to allow for the use of a suite at the stadium for community groups, pledged an annual $1.5 million donation to the community and offered resources to help mitigate homelessness in Las Vegas. Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo signed the bill into law two days later.

The lack of a relocation fee, Manfred said, was a “really important” element of the deal.

“We felt that a relocation fee in this particular situation was inappropriate, where there was significant expenditures by John Fisher and his family to get the stadium built,” Manfred said. “It’s a billion-and-a-half-dollar project. That was really important. We also felt that, in terms of the public support that was available, the waving of relocation fee made that support stronger. We wanted to go into the market in a way that the people in the market felt like we were making an investment in them and looking to grow the game.”

A political action committee, Schools Over Stadiums, is pursuing a referendum for the public to vote on the stadium funding in November 2024. A judge recently rejected the referendum, saying the language in the petition submitted by Schools Over Stadiums was “legally deficient.” The PAC plans to appeal to the Nevada Supreme Court, and if that effort fails, it could refile a petition. If successful, Schools Over Stadiums would need to collect 102,568 signatures — 25,647 from each of Nevada’s four congressional districts — by July to ensure the referendum is on the ballot.

In the meantime, the A’s still need to finalize plans on the construction of a 33,000-seat stadium in Las Vegas, which would be the smallest in MLB by nearly 2,000 seats and rely heavily on tourism to fill the ballpark. The lack of plans did not dissuade owners, nor did the objections of fan groups that lobbied them to reject the move.

On Tuesday night, two days before the vote, three A’s fans wearing T-shirts that read “SELL” sat near Fisher at the restaurant at the Live! By Loews hotel where the owners meetings were held. As Fisher stood up to leave a few minutes later, one fan said, loud enough for Fisher to hear: “Keep the A’s in Oakland. Do the right thing.”

Walking away, Fisher muttered under his breath: “I am doing the right thing.”

Continue Reading

Sports

Ohtani takes Miz deep but phenom fans 12 in win

Published

on

By

Ohtani takes Miz deep but phenom fans 12 in win

MILWAUKEE — Shohei Ohtani greeted Jacob Misiorowski with a leadoff homer, but the Milwaukee Brewers‘ rookie phenom got the last word.

After giving up Ohtani’s 431-foot blast, Misiorowski responded with another dominant outing. He struck out a career-high 12 batters — including two-way superstar Ohtani in the third inning — to lead the Brewers to a 3-1 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night.

“It’s Shohei Ohtani,” Misiorowski said. “You kind of expect [that]. It’s cool to see him do it in action, but it fires me up even more coming back the next at-bat and striking him out. I’m right there. I think it was a moment of like, ‘OK, now we go.'”

Misiorowski, whose fastball routinely tops 100 mph, threw an 88.2 mph curveball on an 0-2 count to Ohtani, who crushed it for his 31st homer. That’s the most by a Dodgers player before the All-Star break.

It was the 21st career leadoff homer for the three-time MVP, who struck out swinging on a curveball in the third and walked to start the sixth. That was the only walk given up by Misiorowski, who scattered four hits.

“Really good stuff, aggressive in the zone,” Ohtani said through an interpreter. “But what really stood out to me was his command and control.”

Misiorowski outdueled three-time Cy Young Award winner Clayton Kershaw, who surpassed 3,000 career strikeouts in his previous outing. Asked Monday about his matchup with Misiorowski, Kershaw said he only knew that the 6-foot-7 right-hander threw hard.

“I know him now, huh?” Kershaw said Tuesday. “That was super impressive. That was unbelievable. It was really special. Everything. Obviously the velo, but he’s got four pitches, commands the ball. I don’t know how you hit that, honestly. That’s just really tough.”

Misiorowski was glad to get Kershaw’s attention.

“I saw something online that he didn’t now who I was, so I hope he knows me now,” Misiorowski said. “It’s kind of cool.”

In five starts since the Brewers called him up from the minors, Misiorowski has already beaten Kershaw and 2024 NL Rookie of the Year Paul Skenes. In another outing, Misiorowski carried a perfect game into the seventh inning.

“He’s just broken the shell,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “He’s just out of the egg, all arms and legs. He’s still got gooey stuff coming off, you can see it, all arms and legs, but there’s something special about him.”

The numbers would indicate as much. Misiorowski is 4-1 with a 2.81 ERA and has given up only 12 hits in 25⅔ innings.

He topped out at 101.6 mph and threw 20 pitches of at least 100 on Tuesday. He also threw 19 curveballs after using curves only 10% of the time before Tuesday.

He was coming off his only shaky performance, giving up five runs — including a grand slam by Brandon Nimmo — and three walks over 3⅔ innings Wednesday in a 7-3 loss to the New York Mets.

It looked as if it might be more of the same after Ohtani went deep. Misiorowski responded by striking out 12 of the next 16 batters.

“I think that’s my job, is to figure it out on the fly,” he said. “I feel like I did it tonight.”

He got out of a jam in the sixth. The Dodgers trailed 2-1 and had runners on second and third with one out, but third baseman Andruw Monasterio fielded a grounder and threw out Ohtani at the plate, and Misiorowski retired Michael Conforto on a grounder.

Misiorowski pumped his fist as he headed toward the dugout, then watched the Brewers’ bullpen nail down the win.

“It’s so satisfying,” Misiorowski said. “It’s just a dream come true, to do what I did.”

Continue Reading

Sports

Giants walk off on Bailey’s inside-the-park homer

Published

on

By

Giants walk off on Bailey's inside-the-park homer

SAN FRANCISCO — Patrick Bailey hit a three-run, inside-the-park home run with one out in the ninth inning, lifting the San Francisco Giants to a 4-3 win over the Philadelphia Phillies on Tuesday night.

Bailey became just the third catcher in MLB history to hit a walk-off, inside-the-park home run, joining the Chicago Cubs’ Pat Moran in 1907 and the Washington Nationals’ Bennie Tate in 1926.

Bailey’s homer would have been an outside-the-park home run in 29 of 30 ballparks, with Oracle Park being the exception.

Mike Yastrzemski reached base twice and scored to help the Giants to their sixth win in seven games.

Casey Schmitt began the rally with a leadoff double. After Jung Hoo Lee popped out, Wilmer Flores lined a single to center.

Bailey, who grounded into a double play and struck out in two of his previous at-bats, then smashed a 1-0 fastball from Jordan Romano (1-4) into right-center field that ricocheted off the brick part of the wall.

Ryan Walker (2-3) retired one batter, with two on in the top of the ninth, to earn the win.

Phillies All-Star Kyle Schwarber had two hits, including his team-leading 28th home run.

Schwarber flew out, struck out and was hit by a pitch before homering off Giants reliever Spencer Bivens into McCovey Cove. Brandon Marsh, who singled as a pinch hitter leading off the inning, scored on the play.

Two days after being named an All-Star for the second time in his career, Robbie Ray gave up four hits and one run in 5⅔ innings.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Continue Reading

Sports

Mets’ Mendoza: Snubbed Soto ‘an All-Star for us’

Published

on

By

Mets' Mendoza: Snubbed Soto 'an All-Star for us'

BALTIMORE — The New York Mets consider Juan Soto to be a bona fide All-Star, despite the snub he received from those who selected the National League squad for the Midsummer Classic on July 15.

Soto, in his first year with the Mets, has performed well enough to earn the respect of his manager and teammates. In their opinion, he’s deserving of a place in the All-Star Game next week in Atlanta.

“He’s an All-Star for us,” manager Carlos Mendoza said Tuesday night after the Mets beat Baltimore 7-6. “It’s frustrating, but I’m hoping in the next couple of days we hear something and he makes it.”

Soto drove in the winning run with a sharp single on the first pitch of the 10th inning. That capped a night in which he went 3 for 5 to raise his batting average to .269 with 21 homers and 52 RBIs.

Soto has walked 72 times, by far the most in the majors, but he can also lash out at a pitcher when necessary.

“He’s got a pretty good understanding of what the pitchers are trying to do to him,” Mendoza said. “There is his awareness of the game, he’s going to see pitchers. There are times when he’s going to be aggressive. Tonight was one of those nights. First pitch in the 10th, he’s attacking.”

Soto made the All-Star team as a member of the Nationals, Padres and Yankees each year since 2021. The streak appears to be over. But his teammates believe he deserves to go.

“What he done all year is just incredible, and the results are good enough,” Mets starting pitcher Clay Holmes said. “The consistency he’s showed up with, at the at-bats he’s taken, is more than an All-Star. He’s one of the best in the game and a big part of our lineup.”

Soto seems rather philosophical about the snub.

“Sometimes, you’re going to make it and sometimes you don’t,” he told reporters after Sunday’s loss to the Yankees. “It’s just part of baseball.”

Continue Reading

Trending