With the MLB-San Jose legal battle out of the way (for now), we can turn our attention back towards Oakland, where most of the news over the last two years has originated.
January 20 – Tuesday is the deadline for the Coliseum City three-month extension, granted to Floyd Kephart’s New City Development group when they took over the project. The Oakland City Council will take up the matter in the afternoon’s closed session. During the evening open session the Council is expected to report on Coliseum City’s progress.
Agenda item for 1/20 City Council meeting
If everything goes as expected, Kephart will get another extension of 3, 6, or 9 months so that he can try to rope the Raiders. The Raiders will probably be given another one-year lease extension, since Coliseum City is not yet a finished product and the Raiders have nowhere else to go for 2015. Mark Davis wants to retain maximum flexibility for his franchise, so a multiyear deal seems out of the question. Meanwhile, the A’s and Lew Wolff will be patiently waiting on the sidelines for Coliseum City to work itself out, wanting no part of the project.
—
February 8 – On Sunday comes FanFest. It’s worth going just to get acquainted with all of the A’s new players. If there’s a concurrent BlogFest event, there’ll be a post about it. Tickets are $10, and as usual you can expect a sellout.
On a personal note, this year’s FanFest will mark the first one since it came back that won’t be held on the same date as the Double IPA Festival, held at The Bistro in Hayward as part of SF Beer Week. Looking back, the doubleheader was truly my favorite day of the year. DIPA will be held the previous day, February 7 (Giants FanFest day). I may be draggin’ a bit during FanFest.
—
February 19 – Pitchers and Catchers report to Mesa, AZ. They’ll be at Fitch Park, as the renovated facility in Mesa has replaced Papago Park in Phoenix.
—-
March 3 – Spring Training Opening Day is a home game at Hohokam Stadium vs. the Giants. You might want to get your tickets in advance, or else the Giants fans will snatch them up. If you want to catch two games during a weekend, come to Phoenix the following weekend, March 7-8.
—–
March 13-14 – Want a different scene from laid back Arizona? The A’s and Cubs are playing a pair of spring training games at Cashman Field in Las Vegas. Yes, you can relive all the splendor that was the start of the 1996 season, then hit the craps tables and buffets.
——
April 6 – Opening Day at the Coliseum. We’ll see if Billy and Bob can work their magic again.
——-
Get comfortable, folks. We’re gonna be here a while.
newballpark.org 
@ML- any thoughts that Liccardo will push to try and move things forward in SJ by proposing vote or trying to lock up remaining parcels and clear site- objective just to keep the attention on what’s going on as it moves towards SC?
Fortunately (or unfortunately) we have time…lots of time. Anyone else sometimes wish Pac Commons would have gone through?
Pulling for my Raiders to get something done at the Coli…Get er done Floyd!
Yep. The Great Recession screwed A’s fans. They’d long be in a new ballpark in Fremont had that not happened. Downside is that they’d now be the San Jose Athletics at Fremont.
So maybe some things are worse than the neverending limbo we find the team in.
Uh Dan, what exactly would have been wrong with the “San Jose Athletics of Fremont?” IF (and still a big if) they never find the way to SJ I’d take the SJ/Fremont A’s any day over the current situation. Hopefully one day a moot point.
You’d approve of that goofy ass name?
Nobody would ever say “at Fremont,” just as nobody ever says “of Anaheim.”
Exactly Bartleby 😉
Other than the SC challenge, I don’t see Liccardo doing much right away. Low priority as a new mayor.
ML: do you know if the new mayor is doing anything behind the scenes? Sure she has other urgent things to take care of but the same group of ppl doing the same thing over and over will never work.
Wendy thurm writes a decent article in deadspin about the A’s plight and then has a total fail at the end- basically saying status quo is fine for the A’s- she is such a freaking gints homer-
Wendy Thurm is a female version of Tim Kawakami. It’s the Giants all the time and nothing else matters to them.
I read it and don’t really see how it can be interpreted as an endorsement of the status quo.
reall? Failing to mention that MLB owners can change TR- failing to mention that MLB teams are expected to place the best interest of the game over their personal interests- and then closing with this? “So what if it means the A’s can’t move to a different city in the Bay Area and build a privately-financed ballpark? The A’s have Billy Beane! They’ll be fine! Just not as fine as MLB or the Giants.”
That’s reaching. The tone seemed critical of the situation to me.
Critical of situation…without calling anyone out for not resolving it… Sorry- maybe it’s knowing that she is a gints homer and having acquaintances who are associated with the gints legal team- their whole strategy is around blocking SJ to force the A’s out of the Bay Area- Wendy thurm knows that yet never does she call the gints on the carpet for their anti- competitive actions
I’m with SMG. She seems very sympathetic to the A’s. I know from following her on twitter, that she is not in favor of the Giants position in this standoff.
Hate to break it to you, but the status quo is fine for the A’s. They’re making money left and right in their current situation and are still fielding competitive teams. Sure they could be doing better, but Wolff isn’t hurting in the current situation or else he would have pushed the SJ issue or started exploring extra-Bay Area options a long time ago. You don’t have to be a Giants homer to realize that.
Depends on your definition of success Dan- while LW isn’t losing money because of revenue sharing status quo is not fine for the A’s-
I’m skipping FanFest this year. The only thing worth seeing is the Clubhouse tour.
I’m absolutely going to Spring Training this season. My tickets, hotel and car rental are purchased. Locked, cocked and ready to rock.
Agree with @GoA’s. One thing that doesn’t get brought up much is the impact the Coliseum has on free agents. They don’t want to play there. Even if money were no object, the A’s would likely be taking a similar approach to building the team just because of the limited free agent options. The current situation impacts the team’s results and not just the bottom line.
@GoA’s: I usually ignore Thurm’s opinions/columns/whatever. She is extremely pro-Frisco
The Oakland-only crowd thinks Thurm is selling Oakland short. You guys are calling her pro-Giants. Maybe you’re reading your own bias into the article.
Any idea when the new scoreboards and ribbon boards are going in? I ride by the Coliseum everyday on Bart on my way to work and I think I saw some activity on the RF scoreboard? Might be my eyes and wishful thinking deceiving me though.
I heard the bulk of the work will occur in February and/or March. There are still the upcoming Supercross/Monster Jam events to schedule around.
It might not be status quo – the new MLB commissioner appears to be taking much more initiative than Selig has done previously. Manfred approved the extension of the A’s 7 year land purchase option with San Jose, (despite Baer’s opposing it) and also threatened to ok the A’s move to San Jose if Oakland didn’t approve the A’s lease. Finally – there may be a pro-active MLB commissioner who will find a solution to the A’s plight.
I am pretty sure Manfred had no say in the land option extension in San Jose. That was between Wolff and the city.
Manfred screamed at Baer that he would ok the A’s move to San Jose when Baer complained about MLB’s supporting the extension, Manfred and MLB are supporting the A’s land purchase option (which obviously doesn’t please Baer much)
Show me a source. I’ve never seen or heard anything from MLB regarding the land purchase option in San Jose.
Your assumption is factual (this must be a first though – a Giants fans with a correct assumption or knowledge) there is no info. that Manfred yelled at Baer or MLB officially approved the A’s land purchase option.
15 comments in and yet no comments on what ML actually posted the topic about? I’m used to this us going off topic (I have been guilty myself), but wow. Not that it matter anyway.
I did. I mentioned my rrRAIDERS!
re: Meanwhile, the A’s and Lew Wolff will be patiently waiting on the sidelines for Coliseum City to work itself out, wanting no part of the project.
So Manfred knows the A’s mess will not be resolved anytime soon, as long as MLB remains committed to trying to get something done in Oakland. The Braves will open a brand new stadium to replace their 20-year-old stadium long before anything is resolved for the A’s and their 50-year-old stadium. Have to wonder if Manfred’s figuring “enough is enough” and would like to give the go-ahead to San Jose. Of course, he’ll be up against the Giants, who will NEVER let MLB come to San Jose, regardless of how much it would be in the best interests of baseball.
Hopefully, that’s Manfred’s strategy – forcing Oakland to commit to the A’s – otherwise MLB will approve the team’s move to San Jose. Lately though, MLB appears to have no problem dicking around with the Giants owners – first suggesting that the A’s would move at ATT Park or approve the A’s moving to San Jose if Oakland city officials didn’t agree to a lease with the A’s, and also supporting the A’s SJ land purchase option extension (the Giants likely didn’t appreciate any of those actions by MLB)
Hopefully the A’s start exploring a stadium in Sacramento now.
Hasn’t Sacramento been looked at and ruled out as a viable MLB market?
Same issue of exclusive rights arises then. The Rivercats switched affiliation to the Giants which massively complicates any theoretical move there by a major league team.
I’m not really looking forward to the LED ribbon scoreboard along the Plaza Level. I like the old-school Lite-Bright mini scoreboards. However, I’m ready for Diamond Vision to disappear forever though I have a feeling Ray Fosse will still call the new video screen Diamond Vision.
@pjk
They may have a Long while back. Things change. Sacramento is growing and improving there downtown.
Sacramento just shot its wad to keep the Kings. No public money left, no corporate money to attract a team, no interest from Wolff.
Plus likely limited TV revenue. If the A’s move to Sac I think they completely lose the Bay Area in their TV market. In Oakland, with no team in Sac, I think Sacramento still factors in.
Did anyone else, catch that Mark Davis quote? I’m paraphrasing, but he said something to the effect of, he had not signed the one year extension just yet ( in Oakland), but that he may have to sign two separate one year extensions, before he can get a deal done. If that’s the case, we may as well press pause and then play in two years, because unless MLB/SF Giants, the court’s, or perhaps Lew Wolff changes something, everything will remain the same until then.
It’s meaningless. He’s waiting on other people to do all the work and doesn’t really know what he’s doing.
@ SMG
You’re probably correct, and Mark may not be able to pull any of this off (since he seems to be depending on everyone else), but that doesn’t mean it won’t take 2-3 more wasted years to figure that out.
@Lakeshore/Neil, You have the current situation called exactly right. We are at a standstill situation for at least the next couple of years, and very possibly even more than that. The Raiders will very likely be setting up a year by year lease extension arrangement with the Coliseum Authority. As for the A’s, they are just waiting and sitting back with the comfort of a flexible ten year lease extension.