I don’t know what got into this week, but it seems like everything at once suffered rapid unscheduled disassembly: We had Wisconsin elected officials squabbling over which exact $350 million to give to the owner of the Milwaukee Brewers, an endless back-and-forth between economic analysts over whether a new Arizona Coyotes arena would be a revenue boon to Tempe or a money pit, a car dealer announcing he was going to build a $2 billion hockey arena on Atlanta’s far northern outskirts for an NHL team that doesn’t exist, Nashville rolling back a rent hike it had just approved for the Tennessee Titans because “competitive potential,” Erie County giving the Buffalo Bills owners total control over their community benefits spending so they could earn a tax break for it, and, last but by no means least, Oakland A’s execs declaring that the team was now fully focused on a new stadium in Las Vegas that would involve more than $500 million in public money, burning (maybe unintentionally?) its bridges in Oakland in the process when Mayor Sheng Thao immediately cut off talks for a new stadium there, declaring, “I am not interested in continuing to play that game.”
With a news week like that, surely nothing else happened of note, right? I wish — then I could have slept in this morning. But events just keep on occurring, so let’s get to the rest of the list before anything else blows up:
- Speaking of the Las Vegas A’s plans, A’s president/registered Nevada lobbyist Dave Kaval declared that 70% of ticket sales would be expected to be locals, while hired economist (ed. note: not actually an economist) Jeremy Aguero of Applied Analysis said the A’s would draw about 400,000 new visitors to Vegas each year. Let’s see how the math checks out on that: If a new A’s stadium were to hold 35,000 people as planned, that’s a maximum of 2,835,000 attendees a year even if they sell out every game. If 30% of those are out-of-towners, that’s 850,000 people — meaning the A’s would have to produce perpetual sellouts and have half their tourist fans come to Vegas specifically to see baseball for those numbers to make any sense at all. Given that there’s no sign that Florida spring training, to pick one example, brings any measurable number of new visitors, and that Vegas is an even bigger tourist draw already than Florida in March, this might just be a slight overestimate — the first of many in the coming campaign for public stadium funds in Vegas, I’m sure!
- If the A’s do leave Oakland, the owner of the USL Oakland Roots and USL W Oakland Soul wants to build a temporary soccer stadium in the Oakland Coliseum parking lot. No details on size or cost or funding, but it is projected to last ten years, at which point the Roots and Soul will presumably threaten to move to Las Vegas.
- Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb says he won’t use “general new fund dollars” for renovations to the Cleveland Browns stadium but rather will “be creative.” Will this mean tax kickbacks that are diverted before they ever hit the general fund, on the Casino Night Principle? Will it mean asking the county and state for money from their general funds instead? Bibb didn’t provide spoilers, but we’ve all seen this movie before.
- If you were worried that the Memphis Grizzlies owners would really lose state subsidies because Memphis reinstated a state legislator who the state legislature had tried to throw out, nope, the state legislature went and approved the subsidies anyway. How much of the $350 million in state money will go to Grizzlies arena upgrades and how much to the University of Memphis’ stadium will be “released by the city at a later date.”
- Charlie Brown should’ve demanded a new stadium for his baseball team.
- And finally, I’m going to be on WPRO radio in Rhode Island tomorrow at noon to discuss none of the above (well, maybe Charlie Brown), but rather the Pawtucket USL stadium plans that are rapidly falling apart. Listen in here, and learn whether I sound energized or half-dead or just Weltschmertzig after a week like this.
After 90 minutes of meaningless fluff Tempe Mayor Corey Woods finally allowed public comment to begin, but only after threatening that anyone who didn’t leave when warned would be arrested by Tempe Police. Based on the comments that went 10 – 0 against the Coyotes, the Coyotes referendums are going down big time, and the 4 councilmembers up for reelection next year will follow.
Do you have a link? I saw the debate but not this. Was all 90 minutes about the Coyotes?
https://youtu.be/VvWcDzxRpNM
None of the meeting was about Coyotes. 10 angry residents spoke about Coyotes in the public comment section along with other issues facing residents.
Thursday night’s regular meeting had nothing about the Coyotes on the agenda, but the public comment portion weighed heavily against the Coyotes. Public comment was delayed by 90 minutes of school awards and repetitive city managers reports. The April 20th Tempe city council meeting should be available on Tempe 11 YouTube soon.
Watching this now. The dude with the transgender puppet was priceless
The nevada Indy article quotes the A’s as saying the ballpark will bring 400,000 unique visitors to Vegas. So less than 5,000 per game.
I don’t know where they’re getting that 400,000 number- it’s also the same number cited by the LVCVA in this article about Allegiant.
https://www.travelweekly.com/North-America-Travel/Insights/Allegiant-Stadium-role-Las-Vegas-tourism
Allegiant getting that number sounds reasonable, the Raiders season ticket base is mostly southern Californians and ticket brokers selling to rival teams. They’ve also had some monster exclusive concerts, like BTS and Mexican National team soccer.
An A’s stadium is not going to get 4,000+ opposing team fans a game. I’m sure it’s a sell out for Yankees, Dodgers, Cubs, Red Sox, but those teams have a lot of fans living in Vegas.
Baseball fans don’t travel like that, and they’re not coming to Vegas in the middle the summer for a midweek series.
It should be noted that not every MLB teams sells out every single game, save for perhaps the big clubs you mentioned. Many a team will have throngs of empty seats during mid-week games; especially if said team is doing poorly. I’d expect once the newness of a Vegas ballpark wears off the A’s will get between 15-20,000 buts in the seats for most games, more for weekends; about on par with the rest of the league.
They’re moving into the smallest RSN market by far to have an average number of butts in seats? Are people in Reno going to watch A’s games on tv now that they’re “Nevada’s team”?
Las Vegas is not a very affluent city, locals will show up for a winner, but anything less than that is a big loser.
There’s also the non traditional workforce. The middle class in Vegas work oddball hours. How does that translate to 81 home games?
Despite the history, UNLV basketball plays to a mostly empty arena. I’ve been to Aviators games in August, the new ballpark with all its bells and whistles was half full (still pretty solid by MiLB standards, but an indicator that locals aren’t going to be outside in the heat).
The Raiders are somewhat immune to this- they attract so many opposing team fans and people making the drive from SoCal. That’s not how baseball works.
If the A’s are bad, my guess is year 2 will be mostly 10,000 or so people. Fisher has not indicated he’s willing to spend the type of money it takes to win- other owners in smaller markets have.
Al Davis has complained
about all the visiting fans
while he pockets their
money…..
Mark Davis, although Al might be mumbling from the beyond.
Typical sports fan/sports media trope about the Raiders fanbase. The NFL kept them from returning to Los Angeles for good reason: The league doesn’t want the FBI, the LAPD, and every law enforcement agency coming down hard over the Raiders’ gangsta following. It caused image problems for the NFL back in the day and it’s something the NFL doesn’t want now.
“Gangsta following?” Why don’t you just say who you mean.
The NFL kept the Raiders from returning to LA because Stan Kroenke knew they’d be at least as popular as the once-and-future LA Rams. So he made sure it was the Chargers, who nobody in LA cares about, who’d be his tennant.
The Raiders have the most expensive tickets in the NFL. This fact likely drives Fisher’s desire to get there despite all the headwinds you outlined to the area. If the season ticket base can be relatively strong due to the casinos and travel agencies buying them up, then the official attendance figures will not be as poor as you suggest. People might not be in those seats if the team is lousy, but from an ownership perspective that is different from the empty seats in Oakland. He would certainly need that to be the case assuming the local tv revenue shrinks considerably going from the Bay Area to Las Vegas.
The same team-provided numbers that say baseball could bring 400,000 unique visitors suggested that the Raiders bring 800,000 unique visitors. Or at least, that’s what ESPN reported them saying.
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/36246762/las-vegas-latest-potential-mlb-team-move-oakland
But the attendance numbers, also from the same website, state that the Raiders’ total attendance was 496,363.
So that suggests that almost every single person coming to the Raiders games would not have been in Vegas otherwise *and* that they’re bringing a friend or partner who does not come to the game with them.
Does that sound plausible?
Virtual fans. It’s a quantum thing.
The numbers are bloated. Beyond that, definition-ally, the ballpark bringing people to Las Vegas is hard to prove. If a group of friends or family were to go to Las Vegas and then go to a game as it is something to do while there, they would be unique people who otherwise would be in Las Vegas. Will conventioneers go to a game while they are in town? Yes. Again, unique people attending a game, but not the reason they are in town. Are there Cubs fans who would see their team is playing in Las Vegas and use it as an excuse to take a vacation to Las Vegas, as Bears fans did? Yes. I do not see a good process for being able to separate who goes into what bucket. I suspect a weekend series where the Cardinals or Yankees come in will bring in a crowd where the travelers are more based on the baseball being the reason they came to town, but for the most part it will not be the case.
Also, much like with the Raiders, travel agencies, hotels, and casinos will make up a significant portion of the season ticket base. They will be doing so with out-of-towners in mind. They can categorize those tickets as going to locals, but the butts in seats almost certainly will not.
I am going to guess that the Cleveland deal will include a long tax abatement for development around the stadium (Cleveland gives 15 year property tax abatements on new residential construction anyway) as well an extension of the sin tax which is what funds all the sports venues anyway
The Browns are hitting up the city of Cleveland because FirstEnergy canceled its naming rights contract for the lakefront stadium. Seems to me like FirstEnergy needs the money to pay some more bribes to Ohio state legislators.
The Browns were hitting up Cleveland way before that. If they want to re-sell the naming rights to someone less sketch, they can recoup money that way.
Hey Neil, Marc Normandin quoted you in his blog this morning and he made some interesting observations. My favorite was him pointing out how Kaval was taken by surprise that this blackmail attempt didn’t work out like he wanted it to.
I recommend his MLB Blog to all readers, not just for this brouhaha but for interesting MLB coverage overall!
Disclaimer: I have zero financial connections to Marcs’ blog (as befits a nobody like me). It’s just good baseball stuff.
Yeah, I saw his newsletter right after I finished this post, as so often happens. I did tweet about it, though:
https://twitter.com/fieldofschemes/status/1649437936419577857
Here’s the direct link to Marc’s newsletter, which is free and highly recommended (we used to edit together at Baseball Prospectus):
https://www.marcnormandin.com/2023/04/21/oakland-athletics-las-vegas-stadium/
If the A’s thought competing with the Giants was hard, wait until they have to compete with Carrot Top. Props to the Top.
I would totally plan a special trip to Vegas to watch the Athletics play if I could be guaranteed that in at least one of the four game set I could watch live as Fisher and Kaval were mauled (preferably on the infield grass) by a white tiger.
I would even pony up for the expensive seats ($35 max though, I’m not a complete fool, even for something like this).
What? Too soon?
I think you mean “stomped to death by a white elephant,” to honor A’s traditions.
Or a rabid out of control possum.
That works too, but the white tiger thing is just sooooo Vegas….
Clark County Commissioner shows some reluctance
https://twitter.com/MichaelNaft/status/1649539163480551425?s=20
This Jeremy Aguero fella is on quite a roll, having also predicted that Las Vegas’ F1 race will be “a billion dollar weekend.”
We have a new contender for official-sounding-person most likely to pump up your projected economic impact.
And, yeah, they’re not going to get anything like 5,000 people per game traveling to Las Vegas simply to go to a baseball game. He’s daft.
Neil, have a look in Seattle Times today. There’s a run on youth athletics funds for MiLB upgrades.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/wa-looks-to-tap-youth-athletic-funds-for-minor-league-stadium-upgrades/
Culinary Union is now calling out the A’s!
Hahaha, I’ve got a feeling that Kaval and Fisher didn’t really understand what they’re getting themselves into.
Their land benefactors, the Fertittas of Red Rock gaming, are anti-Union.
https://t.co/6g7PhCuY8X
No MLB team has had a more profound affect on baseball than the OAKLAND A’s. From the 3-time World Series champions in the 70’s (the mustache gang), to BillyBall, the Bash Brothers and then MoneyBall. It is a very rich tradition. And they blew. The owners and city of Oakland blew it. They had a gold mine in Oakland and they blew it.
The parade for the Warriors in 2015 along Lake Merritt for their first Championship since 1975 showed the pride of Oakland. I pray that the Warrior owners will step in and buy the A’s…
I think many (maybe most?) of us who grew up watching or listening (as was then more common) to network broadcasts of A’s games during the early 70s long for the club to be owned by someone who actually gives a rat’s ass about the team’s fans. Carnival Barker Charlie Finley didn’t. The Haas family did and spent heavily to build a winner (as noted previously, in the late 80s and early 90s the A’s had among the highest payrolls in baseball).
Clearly Wolff and Fisher didn’t care, and now Fisher alone shows his utter contempt for his own customers.
I doubt it is a lack of prospective owners who care about the team that is the problem… more that the club is not for sale. As Neil and others have pointed out, there is precedent in baseball for the owners to step in and effectively order/structure a sale (whether directly – Marge Schott’s ownership of the Reds for example, or by proxy – as with the McCourt fiasco in LA) when franchises are being managed in a way that ‘damages everyone’.
On the flip side, the Pirates, Marlins and Rays ownership have been farming MLB revenue sharing subsidies for years (or decades… and they are not alone). MLB doesn’t seem to want to do anything about this other than grumble… so I wonder what would prompt them to do anything different with Fisher?
At present, he is deliberately fouling his own nest. If he began fouling someone else’s nest, maybe his ownership brothers would do something. Then again, maybe not.
You would have to think that after watching how the A’s have been run off the field for the past decade or so, interested parties have contacted MLB to discuss the possibility of becoming an owner in Oakland. Unless and until he pulls some kind of Marge Schott/Frank McCourt level stuff, it seems unlikely anything will happen to force that.