There’s a podcast called A’s Fan Radio which I listen to once in a while. I try to catch as many as I can: Athletics After Dark and the new Tarp Talk being two others. A’s Fan Radio is not bad when they’re covering on-field stuff. As for the off-field and business stuff, I mostly tune into AFR because of the sheer unintentional comedy (warning: explicit language) of it all.
Perhaps the best moment in the short history of A’s Fan Radio came Thursday, when the siterunners asked A’s fans to boycott various businesses owned (or not owned) by Lew Wolff, John Fisher, and company. Here’s the hearty request:
Surely there’s a meme that could come from this.
There is one GAP store in Oakland, so the boycott there might have some effect. At least it might draw attention. Then there’s the request to boycott the “Fairmount Hotel” and “Sainte Claire Hotel.” The Hotel Sainte Claire recently received some pub for being bought by a coalition including the Wolff family. The “Fairmount” is obviously a misspelling of the Fairmont chain, which has the flagship in San Francisco and another location in San Jose. Surely they can’t be referring to the Fairmount Apartments in Portland, which were converted from a hotel, or the 37-room Fairmount Hotel in San Antonio. That hotel is so cute it has its own dog mascot, Luke Tips, who greets guests and can be requested to stay in a guest room if a guest is lonesome for his/her dog at home (huge thumbs up from me in that regard).
Go ahead. Boycott this. I dare you.
Then again, maybe efforts would be better focused on “putting pressure on Oakland city officials” because when you look back on everything that’s happened related to retaining teams over the last year, it’s clearly evident that the nonexistent effort to keep the A’s in town is related to the nonexistent pressure to keep the A’s in town. As for filing a collusion lawsuit, there are plenty of lawyers affiliated with Let’s Go Oakland. Maybe one of them could take it up. I’m sure the Giants will be happy to pitch in. On second thought, that might come off as collusive.
Chances are that these boycott attempts will have the same effect as most ill-conceived boycotts: zero. After all, there’s no Fairmont or Sainte Claire in Oakland, and many of the Oakland-only crowd claim that there are very few A’s fans in the South Bay, so how much of an impact could it possibly have? Nevermind that most of the guests are out-of-town business travelers who have no clue who owns the hotels. Prove your point and hurt those bastards! And their wallets! Good luck. Oh, and make sure to wear your shirt for maximum impact. Yeah, that’s it. Try this on for size:
#OccupyColiseum
An article with actual substance is due later today. Until then, enjoy your Friday.
P.S. Having an elephant take “batting practice” at the Marlins Stadium is so not cool.
newballpark.org 
Obviously, A’s owners are expected to build – and go broke – in Oakland, if that’s what it takes to get a new ballpark there. Or, keep the A’s in the Coliseum forever. Why aren’t these people out recruiting rich folks willing to spend $1 billion+ of their own money on the franchise and a new ballpark? Once again, it appears moving the team 25 miles to Fremont and calling them the San Jose A’s was not a big deal to these people, but moving them 35 miles to San Jose and calling them the San Jose A’s is unthinkable. ..All this hate-the-owners business reminds me of efforts to drive Colts owner Robert Irsay out of Baltimore in the 80s. It worked. But of course he took the team with him.
man, I don’t know…the Fairmont sure is a nice place to stay at.
Wait, so they want Oakland only fans (all 480 of them) to boycott one GAP store and a pair of hotels (neither of which they could even name correctly) that none of them would patronize in the first place? Wow, now there’s a strategy for change…
I feel bad for saying this about fellow passionate A’s fans, but the AFR letter above is so trashy and uneducated. Their shallow understanding of how boycotts work is alarming, esspecially when you remember these are adults, not angsty 14 yr olds. It seems like the primary reason behind most pro-Oaklanders wanting the A’s to stAy is convenience, as if anyone is going to their games anyway.
I want the dog to snuggle me
Well, I gotta give them credit. I mean, they spelled Gap right. That’s pretty cool.
Will these be the same few folks who bring the “Keep the A’s in Oakland” banners to the games? A few dozen of them surrounded by entire sections of empty seats? Why do they hold the city blameless in all this?
Well they’ve boycotted the team for the better part of 40 years, so maybe it will work. Better yet, why don’t we tell the Faimount, that the city and county is going to renovate the building over the next 6 months so Motel 6 can share the propety with them. That should get them to leave. Theese guys should have been wearing the “stAy” shirts, when they sent the A’s to vegAs. Maybe you shouldnt have been so acomodating to the rAiders. Lew should giva away shirts at the games that say “cee yA”.
Looking forward to the article with actual substance…
Message to self: do not anger Cpl RF Asshole.
Classic.
They’re going to “make an example” of the owners. That should really persuade Selig and the other owners that Oakland is a great place to invest $1 billion in private funds. With each venomous rant from these folks, Wolff has more fuel to his argument that the team needs to leave. They probably don’t have to worry about this ever happening again in Oakland because if San Jose is turned down, the A’s will leave the Bay Area, regardless.
Cpl RF Asshole is a regular on CT’s A’s Talk page on FB. There are a lot of the RF/LF bleacher crew on the page.
#OccupyColiseum is the way to go. LGO should be encouraging members of their Facebook page to buy season tickets. If they can get half the crew to buy tickets it would send a message to MLB. Why. OT facilitate bundling of families that want tickets to a few games and buying a season ticket package for the “bundled” families. Act as a kind of escrow service and ticket distribution center.
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Get Clorox to commit to a naming rights deal that matches the Cisco deal in Fremont from a dollars perspective. Get renderings up that feature the ballpark…
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There is a more productive way to speak with your wallet.
“filing a collusion lawsuit” gave me a good laugh
“Trashy and uneducated,” jeez. Shades of bickering high school cliques. It’s sad to think that we all have probably been in the same stadium rooting for this team at some point.
In an alternate universe, Dan Gilbert would be the perfect owner for the Oakland-Only A’s.
Well. we who are willing to accept a San Jose ballpark are concerned that those with the Oakland-or-nothing stance might just win out – as in no A’s in the Bay Area anymore.
No doubt “Collusion Lew” rues the day he angered such sophisticated adversaries.
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And surely the Sainte Claire hotel is worried about the glut of vacancies produced by the sudden loss of patronage from spelling-challenged, diehard Oakland-only A’s fans. You have to figure that’s a huge part of the customer base for any 4 star hotel in the South Bay.
Can we all head out to the local Gap this weekend and buy some jeans?
Oakland-only-ers need a place to mobilize.
#OccupyKarasHotCorner
OT, but, wow, Oakland is between London and Tokyo in the top 5! http://travel.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/travel/45-places-to-go-in-2012.html?pagewanted=all
Stuff like this should be brought up to combat this ridiculous notion that Oakland is somehow “dying.”
If only placement in a NY Times feature articles meant that Oakland could support a privately built $500 mill major league baseball stadium…
@pjk Where did I even say anything even remotely like that?
Well, thjis is a Web site about the A’s ballpark situation. You post a link to an article about Oakland supposedly be a top place to go. Do you expect us to not do further analysis? FWIW, i’ll bet the #1 spot on the NY Times list, Panama, couldn’t support a $500 mill privately built ballpark either.
@pjk Yes, this is a website about the A’s ballpark situation, which has featured items like an elephant batting at a Florida ballpark. Many times on here, posters have labeled Oakland as a “dying” city, in terms of sports and otherwise. I was just posting a positive, national view of the Town, but apparently one such item is too much for you to handle before you feel the need to get into a “yeah, but…” match.
Um, let me explain again: This is a blog about the A’s ballpark situation. You post a link to a NY Times feature story that mentions Oakland. I, in turn, draw a link between the NY Times article and the ballpark situation, noting the Times article really has nothing whatsoever to offer as far as the ballpark, does it? Understand now? Good.
Not to long ago ML had a series of tweets that were about an Oakland city council meeting that was unrelated to the stadium situation.
When Selig reads stuff like the Stay Thursday item, he surely feels vindicated in his apparently decades-long belief that Oakland never should have had Major League Baseball in the first place. Now MLB is stuck there with a franchise there that loses Big $$, no way to get a new ballpark without somebody going broke and no easy way out.
Nice article, kinda like this one from several years back: http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/05/20/travel/20next.html
So the New York Times thinks highly of Oakland and San Jose. What does this solve?
@pjk Your post offered nothing new or insightful. You were just rehashing the same message you spit out like a mindless drone. “If only (insert any sort of positive Oakland info) meant that Oakland could support a privately built $500 mill major league baseball stadium…” Any time something positive about Oakland is mentioned we get that canned response from you. I was in no way relating that article to any sort of funding proposal. Funding a new Oakland park remains the major hurdle in keeping the team in its home, anyone familiar with the topic gets that. But, hey man, parrot away if that’s how you need to communicate your feelings.
@Nam Turk This isn’t a d#ck measuring contest. San Jose, to my knowledge, hasn’t been referred to as a “dying city” before on here. I was just putting something out there that helps to dispel that notion. Obviously, it’s making some of you uncomfortable.
I know it’s not a dick-measuring contest, hence my asking what this solves. Your article disproves the stupid notion that Oakland is dying, mine disproves the stupid notion (not espoused by you specifically) that SJ is bland suburbia. It’s a push. That puts us back to the real talking points about building a stadium, not which city maybe kinda feels sorta like it should probably have a baseball stadium in it somewhere.
re: Keeping the team in its home:
…It’s third home, actually. A’s played for about 50-something years in Philadelphia and then a dozen or so seasons in Kansas City.
“Your post offered nothing new or insightful.”
“…It’s third home, actually. A’s played for about 50-something years in Philadelphia and then a dozen or so seasons in Kansas City.’
And my point is validated. Brother.
Which of the A’s owners was it that responded to a Barbara Boxer letter about the A’s many World Series titles and winning history in Oakland? He asked: How did Oakland respond to those teams? Apparently, with fans able to get walk-up tickets on game night for at least one of the 1970s World Series. Pretty much unheard of elsewhere. We keep hearing about Oakland’s strong history in Oakland and Oakland being “its home” but the facts about the team’s overall abysmal 44-year record of attendance in Oakland is not mentioned because it doesn’t help the Oakland-only argument. We only hear about the two or three fluke Haas years and that is used to supposedly prove Wolff is suppressing attendance. We don’t hear about 2006, either (AL runners up, #26 in attendance).
pjk. let it go. eb prefaced his link with “OT” and never made any substantial connection to the A’s, merely the misrepresentation Oakland gets as a “ghetto”. Nothing more. *You* then decided to beat your drum over the financing issue completely rehashing an unnecessary and quite obvious point that had nothing to do with anything eb was bringing up. As for their “home” thing. Yes, it’s there third home, but it is, until they move to SJ, still their (current) home. eb wasn’t making any attempt to suggest that Oakland was their only home. Hell, he wasn’t even suggesting in any way that they weren’t going to leave their home, just that the biggest hurdle for viability in that home is the financing.
That is actually very cool. Oakland is a very wonderful and vibrant city. That is not in question, to me anyways, I love it there. And San Jose is great too, the place where my wife and three daughters call home. But it seems that any time Oakland wants to paint itself as viable, the movement tends to trot out all the things that they build. I am not speaking about you EB, I often appreciate your posts, and completely respect your stance of wanting to keep your team in your city. I’m more talking about others that seem to equate building buildings as proof of building a ballpark. I’m no expert, but quite certain they are completely different animals.
@pjk – re: walk-up tickets you said “Pretty much unheard of elsewhere.” Not true. The 1970 world champion Orioles played three home games at Memorial Stadium, with a capacity of about 53,000. Their first game was 51,773 and their third game dropped to 45,341, which is a 14.5% decline from capacity. So they only sold out 1 of their 3 home World Series games in the year that they won. They lost the WS in 1971 to PIT but here’s their attendance: Games 1 & 2 sold out at +53,000; Their 3rd game at home (game 6) drew 44,174 and their last WS game at Memorial drew 47,291. So out of 7 home WS games they managed to sell out 3 of them. The A’s had 10 home WS games from 1972-1974 and they sold out 9 of them. Game #1 of the 1973 WS drew 46,021 out of a capacity of +49,000 and I don’t have an explanation for that game. All 9 other games were maxed out.
Oakland Zoo: Fabulous. Oakland Public Golf Course: Fabulous: Children’s Playland: Fabulous and the inspiration for DisneyLand: Chabot Science Center, California Museum, Lake Merritt, Jack London Square, – all fabulous. Oakland’s support of and commitment to the A’s: NotSoFabulous. Oakland’s ability to enable private funding of a $500 million ballpark: NotSoFabulous….
I think this post sums it up. I’m an East Bay A’s fan who just wants a new ballpark in the Bay Area period. It just so happens that San Jose actually has a coherent plan. I don’t hate Oakland. In fact, I like it. Today, The New York Times came out with an article which rated Oakland as one of the “Top 45 Places to Visit in 2012” in the world. My guess is that Oakland will turn into Brooklyn West in ten years. There’s a lot of positive momentum in Oakland (despite everything that it has been through recently) but just no momentum in building a ballpark unfortunately.
I would add that both BAL and OAK were part of 2-team markets in 1970, with the Washington Senators playing in DC. However, there were over 1 million more people in the Baltimore/DC area in 1970 than the Bay Area (5.6 mil to 4.6 mil).
D*** measuring contest – the worst promotion ever.
@Nam Turk Solve? If you think the link I posted really isn’t worth mentioning than why would you even “counter” it and decry its lack of merit.? I’m not interested in the typical bickering and was only posting an article I thought was a positive for a city that, way too often, gets trashed on here. As for talking points, I’m not interested. I’m sick of them. Just as I’m sick of a lot of circumstances surrounding this franchise at the moment. Specifically, this weird schism in the fan base.
@ Nam Turk – “…real talking points.” Amen.
@davebaby Garden gnome d#ck measuring contest?
@ eb – I agree with you. I say Amen to real talking points because the negative stereotype of Oakland as a whole, while untrue, is a distraction that is brought up over and again IMHO. I applaud your link because it helps to disprove many of these stereotypes, especially to those are only familiar with Oakland through the news.
EB – Gimme four value d**k tickets!
Looking forward to the article with actual substance…(even more so after reading some of these posts)
I definitely do not support the Oakland-only position, but this post seems very petty. At this point it’s clear Oakland is about to lose the A’s, so no need to rub it in.
Garden gnome d$!& measuring contest? That isn’t merely epic, it’s Iliad epic.
How awesome is it that the comments are off topic but still clearly fit into the title “unintentional comedy.” the Universe is a funny place…
“I would add that both BAL and OAK were part of 2-team markets in 1970, with the Washington Senators playing in DC. However, there were over 1 million more people in the Baltimore/DC area in 1970 than the Bay Area (5.6 mil to 4.6 mil).”
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@Columbo – Baltimore and DC are not a single market even today, and certainly weren’t 40 years ago. Two very different metro areas and completely separate media markets, with different demographics, histories and longstanding sports allegiances. They just happen to be extremely close to each other geographically.
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When DC had no baseball, the Orioles made some penetration into the Washington market, but it pretty much like the A’s current presence in, say, Sacramento. A minority taste. Most DC-area fans rejected the idea of the Orioles as a “home team,” and a vocal minority absolutely hated them. Conversely, you would be hard pressed to find many Baltimoreans who root for the Redskins or Nationals.
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So it isn’t really meaningful to look at Orioles attendance as though they were part of a large “two-team market,” when the reality is they are a small market team, and 41 years ago they were a very small market team.
@daveybaby said “D*** measuring contest – the worst promotion ever.”
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Oh, I don’t know about that. It sure brought the ladies out for the game.
@Simon – I was responding to a poster who claimed that the A’s were the only ones to not sell out WS games — plural, when in fact they sold out 9 of 10 from ’72-’74 and all games from ’88-’90. I’ve never lived in the DC area so I don’t know the attitudes of their sports fans there. I do know that the distance between DC and Baltimore is 39 miles and both cities are part of the same metro area, which is about 8.6 million people.