Tag: Lew Wolf

Oakland A’s Commentary podcast with Len Shapiro: Will Giants claim East Bay as their territory when A’s leave?

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San Francisco Giants CEO Larry Baer looks out from the stands at Oracle Park in San Francisco. Baer has been in the 24 hour news cycle for being responsible for tweeting how it’s a shame the A’s are leaving. The former Oakland A’s play by play announcer himself, Baer as Giants CEO played a role in blocking the A’s from moving to the South Bay in 2011 according to former A’s owner Lew Wolf and former San Jose Mayor Tom McEnery. (file photo from San Francisco Chronicle)

On the Oakland A’s Commentary podcast with Len Shaprio:

#1 As if the San Francisco Giants CEO Larry Baer hasn’t got enough blame in the last 48 hours for being a big part in the Oakland A’s leaving Oakland leaving a huge void in the East Bay will the Giants also claim Oakland and the East Bay their territory when the A’s leave Oakland so no team could either move or expand there?

#2 Baer received a lot of criticism in the media and on social media regarding the Giants tweeting this week saying that the “A’s are such a big part of Bay Area baseball history, the East Bay and the greater community.” Former A’s owner Lew Wolf called the tweet by the Giants “disingenuous” and that the Giants stopped the A’s from moving to San Jose by claiming their territorial rights in 2011 when the A’s wanted to build a new downtown stadium in San Jose.

#3 Len you and the late Joe Buerry were managing partners at the Oakland A’s radio affiliate 990 the KATD in Pittsburg and were with the station during the time when the Giants wanted to block the A’s from claiming territorial rights in the South Bay the city of San Jose took MLB to court to fight for territorial rights but the Supreme Court ruled that the Giants had those rights.

#4 Critics say that Baer should have done his due diligence like previous A’s owner Walter Haas did and agreed to give the Giants territorial right to keep the Giants in San Francisco or allow them to move to San Jose. The Giants never returned the territorial rights back to the A’s and even more Baer has fought to keep those right and enforced it to keep the A’s out of moving to San Jose.

#5 The big question is will Baer and the Giants claim the East Bay as their territory after the A’s move out of Oakland and to make sure that no MLB team can expand or do a relocation move to Oakland or the East Bay in the future to claim Northern California the Giants and only the Giants?

Len Shapiro was a former radio station assistant manager for Oakland A’s affiliate 990 KATD Pittsburg

Oakland A’s report: Build it and they will come

Published on by rxsluggerLeave a comment

By Jerry Feitelberg

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred tries to laugh off being booed after being introduced at the MLB 2021 baseball draft on Sun Jul 11, 2021 in Denver (AP News photo) 

OAKLAND–On Tuesday, MLB’s commissioner, Rob Manfred, announced that time has run out for the City of Oakland to make a final decision to support the A’s very ambitious project at the Howard Terminal.

The City Council meets on July 20th to announce their decision. Failure to join in with the A’s to build the stadium means the A’s probably will be looking elsewhere to build their new stadium. Possible sites include Portland, Oregon, Las Vegas, Nevada, Charlotte, North Carolina, and Montreal, Canada.

The A’s, without question, need a new ballpark. The Oakland Coliseum was built to be the home of two sports: baseball and football. The current configuration for baseball has the fans sitting too far away from the infield.

The Coliseum does not have the intimacy of a ballpark, such as Oracle Park in San Francisco, Camden Yards in Baltimore or Boston’s Fenway Park. Before Mt. Davis was built in 1995, the fans sitting in the bleachers could talk to the A’s outfielders. The outfield fence is much higher, and the fans’ view from the seats is much different now.

When Lew Wolfe was running the team, he wanted to move the team to several sites in the Bay Area. He looked at sites in Fremont and San Jose. The San Francisco Giants, who own territorial rights to San Jose, objected.

The Giants gained those rights when they were on the verge of moving the franchise to Toronto or Tampa Bay. The Giants built their new stadium in San Francisco but were not willing to relinquish their rights.

The A’s new president, Dave Kaval, thought he had a deal to build a stadium on the grounds of Laney College in Oakland. He had egg on his face with that highly-touted deal fell through. Undaunted, the A’s came up with a new plan to build at Howard Terminal, a few blocks north of Jack London Square in Oakland.

The original plan, or so though Oakland’s city council, was to build a baseball-only ballpark to be privately financed. The park would seat about 35,000 people.

They were blindsided when the A’s came to them will a 12 billion dollar project that would include not only the stadium but 3000 units of housing, over a million square feet of office buildings, and 200,000 square feet of retail space.

They informed the city that Oakland would have to invest over 855 million dollars to build the project. The A’s tried to show the council that those costs would be recouped by the new tax revenues generated by the project. They felt the additional jobs, homes, and businesses would greatly benefit the city’s economy.

The A’s and Oakland have to resolve several issues. Who will be paying for infrastructure costs? Access to the park and parking issues will have to be settled. Oakland wants the A’s to stay in town for the next 45 years.

The A’s will commit to 20. If the plan is to be approved by Oakland, it has to be a win-win situation. Both sides have to realize there is more to gain than lose.

The fans will be crushed to lose their team. Life will go on if the A’s leave town, but it will leave a big hole in the hearts of the people that have supported this team since their arrival here in 1968.