Carl Guardino’s interview with Lew Wolff and Michael Crowley is now available (MP3). Nothing really new, other than one particular quote from Wolff that I took note of. When asked by a caller about whether it’s San Jose or out of the area to Sacramento or Vegas because Oakland’s not possible, Wolff replied:
I don’t agree with you that the Oakland situation is quite that bad. It’s a fanbase, but the problem is that implementing a privately financed ballpark is difficult.
So what it comes down to, as I’ve been hammering home for the last year or so, is being able to pay for the stadium. Oakland is simply behind the eight ball when it comes to corporate interests and it’s a nonstarter for seat licenses if those ever become necessary. I don’t have specific numbers to back this up, but I suspect that the club seat market is also poor. Even for fairly well-attended A’s and Raiders games, club sections are frequently empty compared to others. If building in Oakland or Fremont was based on an economic model that collapsed (real estate), what is to take its place? It brings to mind comments made by official Yankees blowhard Hank Steinbrenner regarding revenue sharing and markets (via ESPN):
“At some point, if you don’t want to worry about teams in minor markets, don’t put teams in minor markets, or don’t leave teams in minor markets if they’re truly minor,” Steinbrenner said. “Socialism, communism, whatever you want to call it, is never the answer.”
Say what you will about the Yankees, but there’s a reason their ticket prices are so astonishingly high: they’re privately financing $1.1 Billion of the new stadium. Which means that they’re privately financing a stadium, paying luxury tax, and contributing the lion’s share of revenue sharing into the pool. Yet they still can’t fill out a rotation. Hank probably has a nice ulcer over all of that.
Shortly after the market question, the subject matter changed to Wolff’s communications (or lack thereof) with Oakland Mayor Jean Quan. Quan, who was misidentified as the first Asian American mayor of a major US city in Baseball Oakland’s otherwise good interview (Norm Mineta was San Jose’s mayor 40 years ago), has mentioned that she hasn’t spoken to Wolff since his aborted Coliseum North plan, which Wolff himself confirmed. Now, they can both play political points with each of their respective bases by continuing to point this out, or they can actually choose to have a real conversation. Not like anyone’s stopping either of them. And for those of you who say, “so-and-so should act first,” grow up. It doesn’t matter.
Further on in the Quan interview, she suggests that redevelopment is in a much more secure position than portrayed by others who may be signaling alarms (including me), simply due to the legal trouble the state would face in dismantling it. That may be the case, but it isn’t stopping cities and counties which have real, ready-to-go projects from taking the necessary measures to protect their plans. In Oakland’s case, Victory Court isn’t anywhere near ready-to-go, so committing resources to it with so much up in the air is certainly premature. I just have a hard time believing that any city in this era can act on a hair trigger. The process is long and arduous, and if you’ve been reading this blog more than a year you need no further reminders of that.
One thing that puzzles me is that Bud Selig’s committee is working in a silo with Oakland. It is doing the same with San Jose. It is apparently not communicating any of this to Wolff. Why not? Shouldn’t there be some sharing of information to get the best ideas to the forefront? It’s not like we’re dealing with multiple teams competing for the same stadium. It’s the same team regardless of which city is picked. It doesn’t make much sense.
In other news, Santa Clara unanimously approved a resolution to create a stadium authority for the 49ers.
According to BoSox president Larry Lucchino, Fenway Park is expected to stand another 40-50 years. (Well, as long as the climactic scene in some recent movie set in Boston doesn’t happen frequently.)
Over the weekend there was some hubbub about a rough rendering of the Quakes stadium, previously discarded and sent to the City of San Jose for code verification as part of its permits process, showing up on the interwebs. To which I say, Wow. Just wow.
Going back to the Wolff interview for a second, I noticed that the show was sponsored in part by construction firm Webcor Builders. Could they be trying to get in good on the stadium construction tip? They are handling the work at Cal’s Memorial Stadium. Devcon has been involved with the 49ers’ plans and the expansion of Buck Shaw Stadium at SCU.
More on Wolff regarding the A’s future regular season and spring training homes from MLB.com writer Barry M. Bloom.
Also, Ken Rosenthal’s argument against contraction seems familiar.
newballpark.org 
One thing mentioned in the Steinbrenner piece out of NY is that Selig apparently became upset that Steinbrenner spoke to the media regarding revenue sharing. Selig later communicated to Steinbrenner not to talk publicly about the matter. All this being said, imagine if Lew Wolff came out during an interview and gave the entire low-down on the committee’s work and MLB’s pending decision re: the A’s? I think most of us here would jump for joy, but that would not go over well with Selig. As stated before; I have no doubt that Mr. Wolff talks to Selig, committee members, knows their thinking, and knows the final outcome of all this. Mr. Wolff even hinted at this during last nights interveiw, stating that the committee is looking into San Jose in “quite a bit of depth.” Bottom line is that, much like revenue sharing, Selig has given Mr. Wolff marching orders not to talk publicly about the committee’s work in the Bay Area.
Perhaps knowing the end game to this as well, Mr. Wolff doesn’t feel the urgency (or thinks its necessary) to speak to Oakland officials or work with them on their “plan.” If Steinbrenner is to be believed and the big market teams are looking at revenue sharing in disgust, then it’s (again) a no-brainer that MLB will want the A’s in a REVENUE GENERATING position in the near future. This only happens with the A’s in $an Jo$e (not being biased, just stating the truth). It doesn’t happen by suffocating the A’s in the shadows of AT&T Park or moving them out of the Bay to another “minor market.” And no, an A’s move to SJ doesn’t mean that the Rays would automatically relocate to northern NJ (Yankees/Mets territory). I believe all future moves (if they happen) would be looked at on a case by case basis. In other words, no precedent set by moving the A’s 30 miles down the road.
I once sat in the Club Section at a Raiders game. It was awesome! However, there was a lot of elbow room (so to speak). That’s telling you something if I’m sitting in the Club Section at the Coliseum. Lastly for this post (not thread), question RM: why isn’t there an “ESPN Bay Area”?
Yo, Yankee stadium was NOT privately financed. They got a huge taxpayer check to build it. They charge $$$$$ for seats because they want to. I know this site likes to develop business cases and make stakeholders look good but lets be real here.
@wha – Not all of it. $1.1 Billion is private.
There is no such thing as small markets. I bet with all of the noise Steinbrenner is making … they still made a profit! How much more are the Yankees worth this year? Isn’t the ‘YES’ network bringing in major funds for the Yanks? Everyone involved with sports, ownership, labor, are posturing.
ML asked a great question. MLB is talking to both cities, but somehow, the ownership of the Oakland A’s doesn’t know what’s going on in the (Oakland) talks? More posturing in my opinion.
@ML – Sorry dude. But SJ wasn’t a “major” U.S. city 40 years ago. That’s why everyone keeps saying Mayor Quan is the 1st (Asian) Mayor of a major U.S. city.
David,
I asked you this once and I’ll ask it again: got proof that MLB is talking with Oakland? No references to Quan or FB, want actual quotes from MLB.
Are you really implying you know more than Steinbrenner when it comes to MLB markets? Quit while you’re already way behind on that one brah.
Lastly, nice reach at trying to defend Quan as the first AA of a “major” US city. What’s your definition of “major” anyway?
And who’s “major” now?
Population
San Jose – 1970 – 459000
Oakland – 2009 – 409000
And it’s SantaTeresaHills in a single knockout punch.
These days: San Jose – 10th largest city in the country; Oakland – 44th largest city in the country. Does Oakland even qualify as a major city?
The whole “small market” discussion would have to involve an initial discussion on just the semantics, which is ill-suited for an internet message board. I should just say that the irony to Steinbrenner’s endorsement of a more pure free market system, the Yankees’ financial muscle creates the need for socialist elements like revenue sharing.
I wonder how the zealots will respond to Wolff acknowledging their fandom and making a distinction between that and the finances of constructing such a large facility.
The same way they have to me, ML or anyone else making the distinction….
@Tony – why do you keep asking me for links? ML, says MLB is in a “silo” with Oakland as well as talking with San Jose. What part of that don’t you get?!
Whatever David. It’ll have to wait until I get to a PC, but I believe there’s some quotes from MLB stating that they weren’t working with Oakland on a “plan,”
hinting that such action was beyond the scope of the committees work. Need to get off Crapberry to confirm/link.
@Tony – did you listen to the Wolff interview? Get rid of that Canadian Blackberry and get yourself something from SV!!
True, San Jose may have had a slightly bigger population than Oakland back in 1970, but it was still one spread out burb that no one really knew about, except through a song. Silicon Valley’s growth has doubled its population since then and they’re number 10 in population in the US. But, like Oakland, SJ will always be in the shadow of SF, regardless of it’s bigger population.
“Say what you will about the Yankees, but there’s a reason their ticket prices are so astonishingly high: they’re privately financing $1.1 Billion of the new stadium.”
The degree of private financing involved in NYS, whatever it was, has no effect on the prices that they charge. Teams charge what the market will bear. Last year they still drew almost 46,000 a game, so the market will apparently bear the prices they charge. But if the venue was totally publicly funded, would they reduce ticket prices and leave money on the table? No, that’d be bad business.
@Brian – Sure it does. The Yankees’ debt service is somewhere around $60 mil a year. That’s more than some teams’ payrolls. It doesn’t pay for itself.
@David – Club seats are the lower half of the lower bowl about 3/4 of the way around. They don’t go begging for buyers.
@ML – i’m not familiar with the Sharks’ situation at HP. Are there club seats? Do they sell out (club seats) all the time, or frequently?
It seems clear that if Major League Baseball really wants to stay in Oakland, then MLB itself is going to have to build the ballpark with its own money. Wolff doesn’t want to, Oakland doesn;t have the money (forget about the state, too) and no other private interests have come forward expressing an interest.
Sharks have 64 luxury suites and do quite well selling them, from what I understand.
Now Rosenthal chimes in…
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/oakland-as-tampa-bay-rays-need-to-relocate-or-face-contraction-022211
ML, would you pay more for tickets in a privately funded new stadium than you would for a publically funded new stadium? Would the majority of the general public? No, except for a select few who may boycott the publically-funded one, they’re paying for an experience. If that experience is worth $200, that’s what they’ll pay. If it’s worth $50, that’s what they’ll pay. If people didn’t want to pay the Yankees’ prices, their attendance would go down and they’d have to lower prices for maximum profitability. That is the case regardless of whether they have a sunk cost in financing of their stadium or not.
The cause-and-effect relationship is actually as follows: There’s a reason they were willing to privately financing $1.1 Billion of the new stadium: they felt that they could charge an astonishingly high amount for their tickets.
@Brian – I get what you’re saying and I don’t mean to imply that the cost of the stadium is the leading or only factor, far from it. But from an operational standpoint, debt is debt whether it’s player compensation or a ballpark or a TV network. The Yankees are saddled with a ton of debt and they need to service it. Their revenues and debt are both astronomical compared to the rest of MLB.
The Shark tank is typically one of the tops in attendance in the NHL and the luxury boxes sells out regularly. I should know as my company has one at HP Pavillion. We used to have one at the Coliseum, but as the economy went south, we had to make a choice of which one to keep. Since we’re based in SJ, we naturally chose HP…
@ TonyD – there might be something to Wolff having a poker face right now, as in the latest MLB interview with him, he consistently cites having patience: “But it’s important that when a decision is made, that it’s a comprehensive decision. A patient account. It makes the path going forward to a new ballpark as easy for us as possible. As much as I’m the one who’s bugging everybody, I understand the patience I have to have. Baseball has a different time clock than I have.” (http://oakland.athletics.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110223&content_id=16713830&vkey=news_oak&c_id=oak). Another interesting excerpt that i did not know about before: “Recently, Selig has declined to discuss the progress of the committee and Wolff said at a recent owners’ meeting that he’d rather have a “no” at this point just so he can get on with life. Wolff said on Wednesday that he’s not getting any younger.” Wow!
The Sharks are actually 17th out of 30 teams in attendance. They sell out all their games but so do several other teams with larger arenas.
.
http://espn.go.com/nhl/attendance
.
As for the boxes, I know they were selling some of the ones in the upper bowl on a game-to-game basis a few years ago, but haven’t heard about any availability lately.
@Brian – One thing to note about that table – if you resort it by percentage (sellouts), San Jose is the only non-traditional NHL market to make the top half (#5). Most of the other Sun Belt teams are poor performers attendance-wise. San Jose right-sized the arena pretty much by accident and it has worked out pretty well for the Sharks as a result.
Don’t take it from me, but take it from Mr. Wolff: patience is a virtue my friends! By the way, Rosenthal rocks!
Just to put the “major city” thing to bed, there’s a Merc article tonight about Mineta San Jose Airport possibly changing its name to include “Silicon Valley” in hopes of attracting more international travelers. Here’s a paragraph, emphasis mine:
ChiSox GM Kenny Williams takes the opposite position of the NYC blowhards.
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/White-Sox-general-manager-says-talk-of-30-million-players-is-asinine-022211?GT1=39002
@Nic–interesting article. The money has gotten totally insane. That’s one of the reasons why the great innovative former Chisox owner Bil Veeck got out of the game in 1981, finding it tough to compete in the exploding early free agency days.
@ML – Of course i can find articles in the TRIB or Baseball Oakland saying … I think you get MY point …