Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson made some headlines yesterday by asserting that he’s “watching really closely what is happening in Oakland” with the A’s, raising the possibility of the team moving to Sacramento if owner Lew Wolff continues to be stonewalled in his attempts to build a stadium in San Jose.
On the face of it, it’s not inconceivable:
Rank Designated Market Area (DMA) TV Homes 1 New York 7,387,810 2 Los Angeles 5,569,780 3 Chicago 3,493,480 4 Philadelphia 2,993,370 5 Dallas-Ft. Worth 2,571,310 6 San Francisco-Oak-San Jose 2,506,510 7 Boston (Manchester) 2,379,690 8 Washington, DC (Hagrstwn) 2,360,180 9 Atlanta 2,292,640 10 Houston 2,185,260 11 Detroit 1,842,650 12 Seattle-Tacoma 1,811,420 13 Phoenix (Prescott) 1,811,330 14 Tampa-St. Pete (Sarasota) 1,788,240 15 Minneapolis-St. Paul 1,721,940 16 Miami-Ft. Lauderdale 1,583,800 17 Denver 1,548,570 18 Cleveland-Akron (Canton) 1,514,170 19 Orlando-Daytona Bch-Melbrn 1,465,460 20 Sacramnto-Stkton-Modesto 1,388,570 21 St. Louis 1,253,920 22 Portland, OR 1,190,010 23 Pittsburgh 1,171,490 24 Raleigh-Durham (Fayetvlle) 1,143,420 25 Charlotte 1,140,900 26 Indianapolis 1,109,970 27 Baltimore 1,097,310 28 San Diego 1,077,600 29 Nashville 1,024,560 30 Hartford & New Haven 1,006,280
Sacramento is a bigger TV market than St. Louis, as well Pittsburgh and San Diego and a couple of other cities that pretty much define “small-market” when it comes to baseball. It’s also fairly isolated from the rest of the Northern California population center, and has never gotten serious consideration in the past as an MLB city. And what else … oh, yeah, Sacramento doesn’t have anything remotely like an MLB stadium in place, and building one would be even more expensive than the Kings arena that KJ couldn’t really find the money for, and wouldn’t even have the potential revenues of a 365-day-a-year arena. And while Wolff has been saying he can build a stadium in San Jose without major public subsidies, Sacramento residents don’t have nearly the deep pockets that South Bay fans do in terms of anteing up for personal seat licenses and the like.
And I’ve now spent more time thinking about this than Johnson has, so let’s leave it at that.
Sac doesn’t have the corporate presence that’s needed for MLB these days, just another politician looking for headlines.
Lew-Lew’s assertions that the A’s (as in as daze) will use mostly private financing for their mallpark is just posturing until they reveal the investors and financing plans on paper.
Hold on to your wallets folks…
Not really Paul. San Jose’s city law is structured so that if he’s not serious about the private money he’s still got to get it through a vote if he wants public assistance.
I wonder how relevant these TV numbers are relative to team value/success. TV ratings continue to fragment with infinite channels and methods of delivery. In TV sports, nothing even comes close to football ratings. I’m also rooting for a New York/LA NHL final and an Oklahoma City/Indiana NBA final just to see if hockey could beat basketball.
My point is, how much does TV matter here? 20 years ago, I was happy being able to see half of my hometown Detroit Tiger games on TV- but that was my only option. 10 years ago, I could watch every Tiger game and most of the Cubs and Braves thanks to cable. Now I can watch every team, every game. If my local team stinks, I have 30 others to choose from. I still “love” my local Tigers but I may never watch them.
Have any owners pushed their Facebook “likes” yet as a value indicator?
What audience really supports a team more anyway? In the seats or on the couches?
It’s not about how many people you have actually watching your games, it’s about how many eyeballs you have in your TV territory. The size of the market is what’s going to determine how much you can sell cable rights for, and right now cable rights fees are the main thing determining whether your team is going to be the Yankees or the Royals.
Sacramento isn’t really isolated from other big cities at all. Downtown Sac to downtown SF is 82 miles. I’ve made that trip literally hundreds of times in 90 minutes.
The biggest problem is lack of corporate presence. It primarily has State workers. That’s the biggest employer. So when you look for sponsors, who are you going to call? The California Franchise Tax Board?
The FTB Arena is probably not going to happen.
Neil, when you post lists like this you aren’t helping my stress level over whether the Bucks can survive in Milwaukee. Not even in the top 30? Jeez.
On a serious note, it seems clear that the A’s want to re-locate to San Jose for the status more than anything else. The ballclub makes eight figures in operating income each year already. What would they get in Sacto? Another $10 million/year? Big whoop. The brass ring here is a home in San Jose, where the team value will likely skyrocket because some rich guy might one day decide to pay a premium in order to own his local team. I’d even go so far as to say that if the A’s were playing in the Coliseum but it was located in downtown San Jose, there is no way they would talk about moving.
Mike, 82 miles is driveable from SF for a weekend football game. For a weeknight baseball game, is anybody going to drive an hour and half after work and then another hour and a half to get back home? Doubtful.
Neil, bad question to ask. I’ve had co-workers from San Jose who drive from their homes in Woodland (north of Sacramento) and Los Banos every day to go to work.
Sure, and I’ve known people who live in Pennsylvania and commute to Manhattan to work. That doesn’t mean anyone who lives in Manhattan is going to hop in a car and go to the Poconos after work to watch baseball, though. Same goes for baseball fans in S.F. and points south.
I guess you might get some East Bay fans occasionally driving to Sacramento to see a game. But it doesn’t seem like something to build a business model on.
For what it’s worth …
I know plenty of people who regularly drive from Sacramento to Oakland or San Francisco for weekend MLB games. I don’t know one single person who regularly drives from Sacramento to Oakland or San Francisco for MLB games during the week. And it’s definitely not because of the Rivercats.
From the A’s perspective if they move the big league club here where do they move the RiverCats? They both can’t stay here, and cities like Fresno, Stockton, and Modesto have MiLB. I see the RiverCats already being here a bigger obstacle than anything else. The Cats make money, too!
Also…
I remember when the A’s were winning that this was an A’s town. I’m a Twins fan, and back then the A’s and Twins were it in the AL West. I don’t think the fanbase is the question. Sacramento would be a Laker town if they wanted to come here. I just think logistically the A’s coming here is a nightmare.
Neil;
Surely this is just an aggressive response to Houston’s visionary plan to renovate the vacant/abandoned Astrodome in order to a attract a second NFL or MLB team for that city.
I mean, what else could it be???
As said previously, I don’t believe Wolff will 100% privately finance his SJ stadium. If he could do that, then he could certainly raise the cash to buy out the Giants’ territorial claim. This this might be galling, given that he has said he believes Walter Haas’ decision to surrender that territory to the Giants was conditional and that that condition has at no time been waived or met.
If Wolff wants SJ (and he has pretty much rejected any other option, including staying in Oakland under any circumstances), he’s going to have to appeal to the used car salesman in A.H. Selig…
One can argue whether it’s “right” or “fair”, but moving an ‘encumbered’ franchise to San Jose (be it the A’s or some other) is pretty clearly in the best interest of baseball as a whole.
I doubt that MLB will ever come to Sacramento. If the Kings do leave, I think Sac-town should think hard about trying to get a Major League Soccer team. I think Sacramento could be very successful for an MLS franchise.
Just like Portland.
You’re wrong, KJ did find the money for the city’s part. The Maloofs were the ones who could not find the money to get this to happen.
Soccer sucks. An MLS team in Sacramento would fold faster than a cheap hooker who just took a punch in the stomach by a fat guy with sores on his face.
You might want to click the actual link for “couldn’t find the money,” there.