Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf made an appearance on CSN’s Sports Talk Live program. Her segment, hosted by Jim Kozimor and featuring Ray Ratto and Tim Kawakami, offered the chance for Schaaf to field myriad questions about the respective fates of Oakland sports teams. Schaaf spent much of her studio time not directly answering most of the pointed questions, such as Ratto’s inquiries about choosing one team over another or Kawakami’s question about Howard Terminal.
That said, she perked up more than her usual sunny demeanor when describing ballpark talks with the A’s:
Mayor Schaaf on CSN: “The exciting thing for me is that the A’s for the first time have very publicly stated that they are now…” (1/2)
— newballpark (@newballpark) July 8, 2015
(2/2) “…focused on staying in Oakland, that their energies are around an Oakland ballpark, and that is really good news for Oakland fans.”
— newballpark (@newballpark) July 8, 2015
She was also quite excitedly described Howard Terminal, though when pressed on putting a ballpark there she was clear about what she wasn’t prepared to do.
Interestingly, when Ratto asked Schaaf about pushing A’s to Howard Terminal, her reply is that Coliseum is already entitled for stadium.
— newballpark (@newballpark) July 8, 2015
Schaaf: “I don’t think that we’re going to force (A’s) to do something they don’t want to do because we want them to pay for the ballpark."
— newballpark (@newballpark) July 8, 2015
Schaaf went on to describe Howard Terminal as a place that could be home to some sort of sports or entertainment development, referring specifically to a concert venue. Port commissioner and former mayoral candidate Bryan Parker advocated for a waterfront arena at HT, either beside or instead of a ballpark.
As for Coliseum City, Schaaf threw her predecessor Quan under the bus while assuring the panel that Floyd Kephart’s final deadline was August 21, and really September if the City Council wanted to extend things further. The NFL has owners meetings starting August 11, and though the NFL could decide on one or two teams to move to LA at that early juncture, it seems more likely that they’ll hold off until at least November or after the football season ends. That would give Oakland, San Diego, and St. Louis more time to work out stadium deals and allow the teams to sell a full season of tickets without an early move announcement hanging over their heads.
The mayor emphasized the potential for other proposals from the Raiders and A’s, having little positive to say about Coliseum City itself. She’s definitely encouraging the ongoing work by the teams apart from Coliseum City, but leaving CC in play allows Schaaf to play the same wait-and-see strategy that Lew Wolff is playing. No rush right now, don’t succumb to the pressure to provide subsidies the way St. Louis and San Diego are, and don’t commit to a team if you can help it. That will probably work throughout the summer, but what happens when the football season starts, or when the NFL decides to play hardball? Then we’ll see well the mayor handles the political calculus of trying to keep two or three sports teams in Oakland.
newballpark.org 
Schaff rebuttal is a typical political answer – much talk with no substance, perhaps all the parties involved, including Oakland officials, are waiting to see about what the SC will do about the SJ vs MLB case.
1. You’re going to be disappointed by the result.
2. It’s not that big of factor for any of the parties right now, except for Joe Cotchett.
I’m not making any predictions about the SJ vs MLB case. It appears that MLB could be getting concerned about it though.
Kudos to Ratto for pushing the issues directly. It would have been nice to get Schaaf out of her talking points comfort zone, but that’s probably asking for too much in this sort of forum.
From Schaaf’s perspective, you’ve got to think that dealing straight-away with Wolff and one ownership/development entity is a whole lot easier than the Kephart/NewCity/NFL/Davis consortium, or any derivative thereof.
It’s probably too much of a stretch to imply that her comments in this interview support that, but it’s pretty clear at this point it would make her life a lot easier if the Raiders and Warriors leave on their accords and allows her to focus on the Coliseum City/County and team directly.
The interview was a whole lot of nothing, but since she didn’t spend the whole time talking about CC, you can assume it’s going no where, otherwise she would have talked it up. The one thing that gets me, is when she says she is in direct negotiations with the raiders. What could she negotiate with. The whole reason for Kephart, is to front the money. The raiders could call the city everyday, and I don’t know what oak could do for Davis.
Exactly. The whole issue is money. She cited ATT Park but Mark Davis is not in the position to privately finance a stadium. To quote a great philosopher, “Show me the money.”
so it sounds like from everything that’s taken place over the last few weeks is the a’s are the likely team that will stay in oakland.
course that won’t stop the wolff “truthers” out there from coming up with their own conspiracies in regards to why the a’s will or won’t stay and of why the evil wolff along with the a’s will be the reason why the raiders will leave the city.
The A’s are focused on Oakland. Great! Now, it’s time for the city to give up on the pipe dream of both baseball and football stadiums, privately built, at the Coliseum site. Raiders, welcome to Levi’s – a brand new 70,000-seat NFL stadium for your usage.
My takeaway after listening to the interview was that this is exactly what the city is doing. They’re not going to come out and say that the Raiders are SOL publicly, but it sure does look that way if she’s gung ho on the A’s (since we know the A’s requirements call for the Raiders to be gone).
My problem with the interview is that it was impossible to read between the lines because she was so careful with her political-speak. I came away with absolutely no “takeaway.” It was just a lot of “hey, we’re trying to keep everyone without spending public money,” and not much else.
I would love it of someone here took an exact quote of hers and translate it for me into “we’re gung ho on A’s and if that means the Raiders leave then so be it.”
I’ve seen this asked before, but it needs to asked again. If Howard Terminal is so great why doesn’t the city offer it to the Raiders?
I agree. I want to know that is about and someone should ask it. Perhaps Davis values the transportation/BART hub at the CC site?
So that’s a valid reason for Davis but Wolff’s an idiot for not considering the site?
The Raiders don’t want it for the exact same reason as the A’s:
1) Access to the park would be through the edge of Downtown Oakland (already tangled enough with the Maze/880/24/980/80), and it would be *massively* time- and cost-prohibitive to try to get land for new freeway offramps leading to a proposed park (because the alternative is using the existing and already-busy city streets).
2) The entire site will need about 10 feet of contaminated fill dirt hauled away and dealt with … more tens of millions for time, labor, equipment and tests to make sure the remaining soil is NOT contaminated.
3) Where the hell is anyone going to park? You simply can’t get enough fans in by BART to make a Howard Terminal sports venue economically viable.
Thanks for clearing that up. I’m not from the Bay Area but this shebacle is very compelling to me from my vantage point.
The fact that Mayor Schaaf seems very confident is understandable. I’m sure that she has been privately reassured by Larry Baer that MLB is committed to keeping the A’s in Oakland, regardless of what eventually will happen to the Raiders and Warriors. Mayor Schaaf is delusional if she thinks that Lew Wolff is now committed to staying in Oakland. Will Wolff keep the A’s there? Possibly, but it will have to be on his terms. Otherwise, Wolff knows he would be foolish to take unnecessary risks to privately fund and build a new ballpark in Oakland just to satisfy the Giants, MLB, and Oakland officials. With the ten year lease extension at the Coliseum, Wolff has time on his side to wait things out to get the best Bay Area new ballpark deal for his A’s, and San Jose remains very much in the mix, as well.
As I have stated before….is SJ were to open up today….Wolff would be in SJ tomorrow. Wolff wants SJ is willing to wait for the SCOTUS which will probably rule in SJ’s favor. Hence why Manfred keeps saying things like “well if SJ didn’t have the law suit…things would be moving forward faster”….blah..blah…
If the A’s don’t want Howard Terminal (like idiots)…the Raiders should look to take that spot!
Again…the NFL owns MLB…prove of that is NFL regular season game ratings dominate MLB playoff game ratings. That says alot in itself. NFL is King!
And fans are going to park where?
…and BART is going to put a new stop where?
What, don’t you have a boat? /s
They could tailgate in the harbor on dinghys, I guess, but there’d be a lot of drunken idiots drowning.
Watching (listening), Mayor Schaaf in that interview was depressing. (Unfortunately)
It was….she said a whole lot of nothing and it was a waste of time. Window dressing.
Hey Wolff fans/followers who are on Wolffs payroll who post here.
Stop making Wolff the good guy when he hates the Oakland/Coliseum City and has been actively trying to leave the area for years to the South Bay. In addition, Wolff and GM Billy Beane also decided to dismantle the team with the best record in baseball (A’s) in August 2014, which became the last team in the AL to make the playoffs and fade badly thereafter. Obviously, there is another agenda and what “genius” decides to alienate his fanbase in Oakalnd for years by talking down about the city and saying a waterfront ballpark Howard termina;/JLS will bnotwork for them> Fisher and Wolff need to go!
As far as Lew Wolff–he should just go away. Mr talk down to his host city for a decade can go jump in a lake, oh and brilliant move by him moving the A’s minor league team from Sac to the Midwest…go from a hub of 85 miles away in a charming beautiful 12k ballpark, and then SF promptly moves in–what a dope Wolff is. Wolff tried to build ballpark villages before and now is against it and wants nothing but parking lot around a new ballpark at the CC site? Wolff talks out of both sides of his mouth!
Lew Wolff should be forced to sell the team to a local group who want that waterfront ballpark Howard Terminal/JLS site or move forward with Raiders at CC or at Howard Terminal if possible. Baseball plays second fiddle to the NFL anyways and that is a fact!
You do know that it was the Rivercats decision and not the decision of the A’s to change affiliation. Minor League teams have contracts with major league teams. When those contracts expire, it’s like free agency. The minor league owners try to woo the MLB team that they think will be in their best interest.
ML addressed your ballpark village comment yesterday. The Coliseum is public land. Adding housing to public land requires the inclusion of low income housing. This makes adding housing at the Coliseum site not profitable whereas it would have potentially been profitable at other sites like Pacific Commons.
The Raiders haven’t signed on to CC either. They’ve raised objections just like the A’s even though the proposal favors the Raiders over the A’s. The Raiders are also not considering HT/JLS. Should Mark Davis be forced to sell the team?
Oh…low income housing not profitable over a 30 year span? Who says it would be only low income housing? Just because Wolff says so? Ridiculous.
No one is saying that it has to all low income housing. Because it’s public land, any housing built on the land will require that a percentage of the housing is built specifically for low income housing. Developers will lose money on the low income portion.
Why do you think Kephart proposed that the city pay for low income housing in his proposal?
“brilliant move by him moving the A’s minor league team from Sac to the Midwest”
Wow, you really have no idea what you’re talking about, don’t you?
1) The Sacramento Rivercats ended their affiliation, not the A’s.
2) Lew Wolff is a *minority owner*, got that? And that even if he wasn’t, you can’t “force” a sale.
3) Howard Terminal is practically a SuperFund site, try again.
yeah never mind him. a while ago he said wolff basically sabotaged the victory court site when it was in reality a site that had very little to zero chance of happening due to the local businesses not wanting to move out of the area.
these wolff truthers will say ANYTHING to make wolff look like the bad guy and the city and or the raiders the victim of wolf’s treachery. narrative is wolff is a big old meanie who hates oakland.
if the a’s under wolff do happen to build a park in oakland i’d bet these truthers will still find reasons to hate wolff and i think the most likely one would be what i’ve been reading in recent months that he’ll be the main reason why the raiders leave oakland.
Trying to tell me the A’s couldn’t have tried to keep the relationship with the Rivercats in Sac? Are you dense? Plus yes….Fisher is the main guy but Wolff is the turd who already as alienated the fanbase in Oakland mulitple times and chooses not to keep top talent with a constant roster turnover every 3 years claiming they have no money. A lie….
The A’s DID try. They always valued the relationship with the River Cats, but Sacramento’s ownership wanted to hop on the Giants bandwagon and try to reap the benefits of that.
The fact they were already connecting themselves as “Triple-A Affiliate of the World Champion Giants” before even playing one game as their affiliate, having the mascot in the parade, and bringing the trophy to Raley Field says enough on that front.
Short of throwing stacks of cash at Sacramento’s ownership just to keep the partnership, which would have been silly, the A’s did just fine in getting the Nashville affiliation, where the Sounds opened a brand new stadium this year.
Meanwhile, the River Cats are in last place but drawing better crowds for the time being, which is pretty much what most people in the know expected since the Giants never had any on-field success in Fresno, especially compared to the A’s in Sacramento. They exchanged having a successful, winning minor league team for trying to draw more fans simply because the Giants are the hot thing now.
cisco007, I’d tell you to stop talking about things you have no understanding of, but if you did that you’d go silent. On second thought, that wouldn’t be a bad thing.
The IMPRESSION I got from the interview is that Schaaf would like to push the Howard Terminal site to either the A’s or Warriors saying it is a spot for a concert venue or entertainment center which fits a smaller park like baseball or bball arena. She mentioned she is willing to support infrastructure costs via public money if it is profitable for the city in the economic long run. These “infrastructure” costs could include freeway access/off ramps, public transportation to/from Bart, parking lots, environmental and land upgrades? The owners then foot the bill on stadium construction. This could allow at least 2 teams to stay in the East Bay with the Raiders most likely getting to play with the Col site which is most ideal for football.
I don’t know, realistically I hope to see all 3 stay in the Bay and that could be the Warriors in SF, A’s in Oakland, and Raiders sharing Levi’s. Raiders could pay for any improvement costs to Levi’s.
Schaaf is just a better looking version of Quan, I say this meaning she is much easier on the eyes to look at.
Otherwise she offers no solutions to this decade old problem of no public funds.
The Warriors were publicly funded on their current Arena in 1995 and it went very well.
Schaaf needs to do something similar here to make this work. San Diego is trying with County/City funds on a small level here. She can do the same and the Warriors are proof it can work for Oakland.
SBLs, Suites, Sponsorships will sell in this day and age. This is not 1995, this 2015 and the Bay Area is booming, and several corporations would love a cheaper option than what the 49ers are offering. Especially in the SF-Oak area.
This with the Raiders as bad as they are…..
It’s funny how the Wolff fans on this board forget that this Kephart proposal was an INITIAL proposal and starting point to keep negotiating with Raiders and find a middle ground. If this initial proposal was so bad as the critics seem to think….than there is still time to for the parties to NEGOTIATE and find that middle ground to make it work. Stop panicking Lew Wolff fans!
This proposal was so bad it has been viewed as a nonstarter. Face it – Kephart has no viable solution to fill the $400 million gap. If Oakland won’t pay and the NFL won’t charitably pay for the stadium completely on its own, then the Raiders won’t be getting a new stadium in Oakland. Why would the NFL pay 100% for a stadium in what has proven to be one of its weakest markets?
It’s too bad the “genius” Wolff already alienated the Oakland fanbase and not him and his people (on these boards) have been trying to conduct damage control and also by being cheap and letting his (firesalesman Beane) run amok by not spending to keep good talent here in Oakland to keep team competitive. No guarantee Fisher and Wolff will be build here if Raiders leave..especially if SJ opens up in 2-3 years.
Viewed by who as a non starter? You…and the Wolff worshippers?
Davis can sell 20% interest in the Raiders and build a stadium without Kephart’s help. Also, the Raiders probably can finance $900 mil. for a new stadium either in Oakland or Carson. San Diego might not be moving though. The NFL evidently is impressed with by San Diego city officials’ recent efforts to keep the Chargers. Considering the NFL’s policy of preferring that franchises don’t relocate their teams – that might be a difficult hurdle for the Chargers owner to overcome. The Chargers may be bluffing about their proposed move to Carson anyhow.
1. Who, w/ capital, would buy a non-majority stake of team w/ Tommy Boy at the helm?
2. The Raiders can’t finance $400 million for a stadium by themselves in the Bay Area. That’s why they’re looking for handout from Oakland.They certainly cannot finance $900 million required for their own place in Los Angeles. That’s why they’ve piggy backed on the Charger’s deal w/ Goldman Sachs.
If the Raiders could get financing from a bank, why haven’t we seen them attached to GS or another lender? GS underwrote Levi’s down the road, and they are willing to underwrite Chargers.
The Raiders already have commented that they can finance $500 mil. towards a new Oakland stadium – they likely could do better than that – especially if Davis sells an interest in the team. Also, at this point, Davis is more credible than Oakland city officials are. There is also a good chance the Chargers stay in SD, even if GS is willing to finance the Carson plan.
Duffer – Yes, the Raiders can finance a couple hundred million right now. They still, however, need to reach that $900 million threshold. How are they going to make that deficit up in Oakland w/o a direct public subsidy?
MD’s relative credibility to Oakland pols has almost nothing to do w/ his ability to raise money. What is your point?
Everything is in flux right now, including the Chargers situation. You are making far too many conclusions w/ little evidence to back up any of them.
@tribtowers: I’m not making a point – although it’s possible the Raiders might be able to finance a scaled down Carson NFL stadium without San Diego as a partner – if Oakland city officials don’t work out a deal with the Raiders.
“If the Raiders could get financing from a bank, why haven’t we seen them attached to GS or another lender? GS underwrote Levi’s down the road, and they are willing to underwrite Chargers.”
This is silly. They won’t underwrite Raiders in Oakland or the Chargers in San Diego…they WILL underwrite BOTH in LA, however. Not hard to figure out why. Don’t know why you’re trying to say they’d only bankroll the Chargers. If that were true then what do they need the Raiders for in Carson?
TribTowersViews: you are the one jumping to conclussions and making silly assumptions. Also, it’s doubtful you are actually an A’s fan, do you even follow bay area sports closely? You believe that pro giants hacks such as Tim Kawakami and Ray Ratto are actually objective, solid sources about the A’s (LOL)
Ratto (along with his employer, the Giants) has even suggested a few times that the bay area is a one MLB team market only – and that the A’s should move. Here is another example of Ratto’s brilliant anaylis. Ratto said that MLB will win the SJ vs MLB lawsuit because MLB has more money – very brilliant, detailed analysis (LOL) also 100% wrong.
Concerning the 2010 NFL vs American Needle SCOTUS case, for example, the NFL not only has more money than MLB – it also definitely has more money than American Needle, Yet the SCOTUS voted 9-0 in favor of American Needle (overturning a 7th district court ruling that supported the NFL ) – you are likely a giants fan posting as a fake A’s fan.
Are you aware that the City of San Jose didn’t submit a reply brief to the MLB’s brief by last Friday’s deadline? Your confidence in the lawsuit is entirely misplaced.
Guesticles – Who is in the driver’s seat in Carson? The Chargers have led the process and only invited the Raiders at a late stage after GS was attached. They have a relationship w/ a major institutional investor, regardless of the Raiders involvement. So again, where is this for Mark Davis in Oakland?
Duffer – your level of reasoning hovers weakly above that of cisco007.
ok TribTowerViews (genius): Explain why Carmen Policy (who is directing the Carson project) already
has commented that the stadium could be funded even if the Raiders were the only team that moved there (implying that the Chargers may not join the Carson project) So much for your theory that GS would fund the Chargers only and exclude the Raiders.
Duffer – I’d like to see a source for that claim. Even so, LA is a much bigger market than Oakland’s half of the Bay Area. Also such a scenario would only have one football team in LA County. Therefore less competition for sponsors and seats.
All that is immaterial to the real question. One more time, where is the public financing partner for the Raiders in Oakland?
“who’s in the driver’s seat.?”
Umm, nobody. They are sharing expenses and revenue. If Chargers could do it alone they would. If they could finance it privately at all with GS in SD they would do it there. Your entire premise is laughable. You have no idea what you’re talking about.
It’s funny how Wolff-haters forget that the AUGUST 21 DEADLINE for NewCity/Kephart to have all their ducks in a row as far as financing *and a team commitment* in order to consider proceeding … and Kephart doesn’t even have the Raiders on board.
Oakland has given him extension after extension, waiving piece after piece, in order to try to work with him, and in the end he delivered: “Gimme money, land, and ownership. What, you want a definable return on your money? Nah, not in the plans.”
Meanwhile, Wolff still has the “I’ll cover the Mount Davis debt” card.
It’s funny how you still think anything you type here is worth serious consideration.
Everyone is saying how bad a deal it is because it would require Mark to sell 20% of the team. The fact is, a couple months ago, Mark Davis actually said he would be willing to sell a minority interest in the team to help pay for a Stadium!! Try again Wolff worshippers! NFL owns MLB!
@ cisco007
Re:
“Everyone is saying how bad a deal it is because it would require Mark to sell 20% of the team. The fact is, a couple months ago, Mark Davis actually said he would be willing to sell a minority interest in the team to help pay for a Stadium!!”
I may not always agree with you, but you are absolutely correct on this point. I don’t know what the rest of the proposal looks like, and the fact is it may not be good enough for the Raiders to stay, but again on this point you are correct.
I actually think Davis would take a deal that was not as good for him (personally), if he could make it happen in Oakland. That’s not to say he would take anything just to stay in Oakland, but it’s clearly where he wants to be and if it’s possible (may not be), he would probably take less to make it work.
The fact that the deal requires that Davis sells a chunk of the team isn’t the reason why it’s a bad deal.
The deal gives all of the upside to New City and all of the risk to Oakland and the Raiders.
New City profits from all of the additional development. The deal sticks Oakland with the bill for affordable housing when developers typically have to pick this up in exchange for the right to build. In addition, New City is also asking for the city to pay for parking garages, all of the infrastructure and eating the Mt Davis debt.
In exchange for sticking the city with these additional costs, New City is graciously offering to purchase the land at below market rate.
In terms of the Raiders, outside of the partial sale of the team, they’re not getting any help from New City even though New City wouldn’t be getting the opportunity to profit from the additional development if not for the Raiders.
You could also argue that New City is under low balling the Raiders. If the Raiders were put on the market, they’d likely go for more than $1B meaning the 20% stake should be worth more than $200M.
@ Slacker
I did say:
“I don’t know what the rest of the proposal looks like, and the fact is it may not be good enough for the Raiders to stay”
It also could not be good for Oakland/Alameda County; I believe the very fact that parts of it were leaked suggests someone doesn’t think so.
But, cisco007 is correct in pointing out:
“Everyone is saying how bad a deal it is because it would require Mark to sell 20% of the team.”
I don’t think everyone is saying that, but I have heard more than one so called expert clam that vary thing cisco007 is saying, when Davis has already said he was open to that.
Perhaps the problem with sports economist is not that it’s a bad deal for the Raiders, so much as it may not be as bad a deal for the municipality, considering the municipalities are usually getting ripped off.
I’m not saying it’s a good deal all I’m saying is these so call experts are judging a potential deal (with limited information), from the bases of these teams getting everything there way in the first place.
@Lakeshore – You’re absolutely right that a lot of the comments on radio and TV about the deal are saying it’s bad because it would mean the Raiders have to pay their own way and give up part of the team to do it.
My comment is more about what people are saying on this site as that is who Cisco seemed to be addressing.
There definitely could be more to this deal than what has been leaked. Based on what we do know though, this is a bad deal for the Raiders and the city and a great deal for New City.
We also know that the Raiders haven’t signed on to the deal. Just based on Schaaf’s comments I doubt the city is on board with this either.
While the additional details might make this a bit better, I wouldn’t bet on it being a night and day difference.
Seems like an OBVIOUS attempt by someone to sabotage the project for some unknown reason, (more likely Miley and or someone who is in cahoots with Wolff and his people). There is surely some risk that Kephart and his company may be bearing on the rest of this massive development. Perhaps with some of the housing, office and retail parts of this project. It would make sense to me for the Raiders to take the risk on the stadium and Kephart on the rest. Until we get the FULL report, we just don’t know.
somebody, quick! call seven on your side!
@jeffreyaugust
That was funny; they have been running that segment for years.
So first you argue that Wolff wants nothing to do with Oakland and only wants San Jose. If the CC Raiders deal goes through, that’s better for Wolff because it takes the most viable Oakland option off the table. Instead though Wolff goes in cahoots with city and/or country officials to try and scrap the deal apparently just as a way to harm Oakland and the Raiders.
Wolff must hate Oakland and the Raiders so much that he would damage his own interests just for the possibility of hurting Oakland and the Raiders.
There’s some powerful delusional thinking going on here.
Right? If Wolff wants out of Oakland so badly, you’d think he’d be doing everything he could behind the scenes to ensure the city picks the Raiders over the A’s, thereby giving him more ammo for the move to San Jose.
It takes a pretty big tinfoil hat to convince yourself that he’s trying to get the city to choose the A’s just so he can turn around and do nothing with it.
This proposal has ZERO public funds right? You people need to realize this initial proposal has confidentiality agreement agreed to by both sides and it was borken. Sabotage.That means there’s a specific date set aside for all info to be released.
This proposal has plenty of public funds and doesn’t specifically explain how any stadium is paid for.
BTW, I hear the Rose Bowl people voted thumbs-down on letting the NFL play there. Limits the NFL to the ancient Colosseum, two baseball stadiums and the 27,000 Stubhub Center soccer stadium in Carson, of all places, as temporary venues.
@ML: “Are you aware that the City of San Jose didn’t submit a reply brief to the MLB’s brief by last Friday’s deadline? Your confidence in the lawsuit is entirely misplaced.”
According to this…
http://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docketfiles/14-1252.htm
… San Jose filed on June 30th and the SCOTUS will either discuss the case has been “DISTRIBUTED for Conference of September 28, 2015.” SCOTUS will decide on that day whether they will hear the case or they will not discuss it and by default not hear the case at all.
Sorry that last paragraph came out real messy… should say…
… San Jose filed on June 30th and the case has been “DISTRIBUTED for Conference of September 28, 2015.” SCOTUS will discuss and decide on that day whether they will hear the case or they will not discuss it and by default not hear the case at all.
Based on more research, this means at least one justice has decided that this case should be on the very short list of cases the court should all get together and talk about whether or not they should hear the case.
This is far from over.
Interesting. I’m not going to put too much into it, but at least they’re going to discuss the case. Based on previous statements by current and former justices the ATE certainly cuts across typical partisan lines.
Even though it has gone to conference, a very low percentage of cases move any further from that point.
However, I think this one has a better-than-average chance simply because the way it has moved up the legal-system chain. The lower courts are not actually ruling in favor of MLB per-se, but rather they are saying “we have no jurisdiction because the SCOTUS gave MLB the ATE and only they can take it away” (paraphrased obviously) – which is really ruling in favor of MLB but only in the sense they were refusing to take on the issue rather than because of any standing in law.
I don’t profess to know the chances of this case succeeding, but if the court wants to take on a controversial, earth-shaking case, this one is it. MLB’s sacred anti-trust exemption is due for review.
FWIW, we can be sure MLB tried to coax San Jose into dropping the case but offered simply nothing as an incentive.”So if we drop the case, we’re going to be able to compete for a team?” “Uh, no. You won’t.” “If we drop the case, we’ll no longer be the exclusive ‘territory” of the Giants?” “Um, you’ll still be Giants territory.”
“if the court wants to take on a controversial, earth-shaking case, this one is it.”
Not how I would describe this case. The ATE isn’t really affecting anyone other than the A’s and their fans right now, and I doubt many people outside the Bay Area care much one way or the other. As far as controversy, there seems to be a general consensus (among the small number of wonks who are following this at all) that the ATE was poorly reasoned to begin with, has gotten less defensible over time, and only endures because of the weight of longstanding precedent and the possibility that change would require a dysfunctional Congress to act.
If the court wants to take on a controversial, earth-shaking case, they could always take on a case allowing them to uphold the Affordable Care Act or legalize gay marriage. Oh wait…
@bartleby
Adding to your point, about the ATE effecting only the A’s and their fans (at the moment), and that people outside the Bay Area don’t care much one way or the other.
The sad truth is, there aren’t enough people inside the Bay Area that care much one way or the other. (unfortunately)
Things may be finally moving pretty quickly here… we have NFL owners meeting on the fate of LA’s teams and the SCOTUS deciding whether or not they are going to take on the SJ vs MLB suit all within the next 75-ish days or so…
I think it is very possible we may possibly know the fate of Oakland’s teams this fall.
@ DTP
I guess it is possible, but these things do tend to drag. (not that they haven’t already) You are correct however, in that if we don’t exactly know the fate of Oakland’s teams by this fall, we should have a good read on the direction that fate will be going.
Knowing the fates and actually getting something done are two different things as well. The SCOTUS may decide the A’s are subject to the whim of MLB and have to stay put and the Raiders get shipped off to LA, but that doesn’t mean the A’s and the city can agree on a stadium any time soon. That could still drag on for sure, especially with the A’s long-term lease and revenue sharing as their ace-in-the-hole.
Also, if SCOTUS decides for MLB and the NFL doesn’t allow the Raiders to move… what then? Ten more years of nothing happening? Back to speculating about Levi’s? Rennovate the O.Co? This is the worst possible scenario — reboot all the way back to square one IMHO… Terrible situation for the fans, no matter where you fall on the move vs. stay spectrum.
SCOTUS is the domino that can get the whole chain moving here. I really think the NFL won’t decide until they know the outcome of this decision.
You have to admit, this is by far the best glimmer of hope anyone has had on this whole mess for a long long time though.
@ DTP
All vary true.
If the SCOTUS does decide to take the case watch MLB give a quick approval of the A’s move to San Jose. In no way will MLB risk jeopardizing their sacred ATE for a team(A’s) that only wants to build their new ballpark within, what everyone really knows to be, already within their existing shared current market.
If they cave that sets a precedent for any city in the world really to sue MLB on behalf of any team that wants to go there. That is, if they cave, they have essentially abandoned their ATE.
MLB has placed its bets and now they have to throw the dice on this one and see it to the end. If they lose their ATE, it will be because it was taken from them, not because they gave it away by giving up on it.
I respectfully disagree with you. If SCOTUS does take the case, I think MLB will put together their best arguments for maintaining anti-trust exemption. Considering that past legal rulings have not overturned the exemption, MLB would have no reason to not be confident of winning again and thus no reason to strike a deal to allow the A’s to move. On the other hand, if Congress were to consider taking ATE away from MLB, then I would have to agree that MLB would approve a deal to allow the A’s to move to San Jose.