Liveblogging that ginormous ESPN article about how the A’s picked Las Vegas

ESPN writer Tim Keown dropped a classic ESPN 7,000-word anecdote dump this week about how the Oakland A’s ended up casting their lot with Las Vegas, with interviews with all the major players, including Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao and team owner John Fisher. Now that I’ve finally got to the end of it, let’s go over some of the juicier bits:

AT 6 P.M. ON Wednesday, April 19, Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao was driving home from an event for the opening of a local business when she received a call from A’s president Dave Kaval.

“Hey, just a heads-up,” Thao recalls Kaval saying. “Somebody leaked to the press that we have a binding deal with Vegas.”

Killer lede! Made all the more pungent when the punchline arrives several paragraphs later:

When the “leaked” story was posted in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the Oakland contingent felt like they’d been played for fools. Kaval was quoted throughout the piece — by name — as was commissioner Rob Manfred.

“Not sure it’s a leak when you’re quoted in the story,” [Thao’s chief of staff Leigh] Hanson says. “Pretty sure that’s not how leaks work. If you’re going to be strategic, try not to be so sloppy.”

Just your typical LOLAthletics stuff here, but it is pretty remarkable that Kaval simultaneously tried to stay on Thao’s good side by throwing the Review-Journal under the bus while simultaneously going on the record with the Review-Journal, as if hoping that nobody in the mayor’s office could read.

The A’s have filed a relocation application with Major League Baseball, where it will be reviewed by a three-man committee consisting of Kansas City Royals CEO John Sherman, Philadelphia Phillies CEO John Middleton and Milwaukee Brewers chairman Mark Attanasio.

Two of the three owners on that committee are currently trying to extract stadium subsidies from their host cities under potential threat of relocating, so maybe slight conflict of interest there.

“I can’t really understand how they can say they were blindsided,” Fisher says. “At the end of four years of negotiations, we were nowhere.” …

“To say we were nowhere is BS,” Mayor Thao says. “To say there was no proposal is total BS. Let’s be very clear: we did have a proposal. But maybe it wasn’t a proposal John Fisher could afford.”

Rowr!

A group that calls itself The Last Dive Bar — a reference to the Coliseum being baseball’s last dive bar — recently helped buy electronic billboard space in the stadium’s parking lot, visible to the thousands who sit in traffic on the infernal Nimitz Freeway, that addressed Fisher’s mother. In massive LED letters, it read: “Doris, get your kid.”

Double rowr! Truly, no matter how this A’s saga ends, it has already delivered some of the best baseball anecdotes ever, and for that we must be thankful.

BOTH SIDES CAN find agreement on one thing: Fisher fell in love with Howard Terminal.

How in love was he?

One day in the early stages of the project’s development, Fisher, [Danish architect Bjarke] Ingels and Kaval climbed over a chain-link fence and entered federally protected land — “totally illegal,” a source says — where they stood at the base of one of the 393-foot tall cranes, took a deep breath and began their ascent. … They took a selfie and stared down at Howard Terminal, at its potholed streets and railroad tracks and the mountains of shredded metal at Schnitzer Steel, and saw nothing but possibility.

Let’s pause for a minute to appreciate this: The billionaire owner of a pro sports team, his right-hand man, and a world-famous architect broke into a federally owned site so they could climb a decommissioned shipping crane and look down at and drool on at a parcel of land where he could maybe one day build a stadium. He could have just rented a helicopter as is traditional, but no, he walked up 40 stories worth of steps — you know, Fisher is 62 years old, I feel like I need to call BS on this, but it’s too wonderfully insane a story not to be true, so I’ll allow it.

To seasoned developers, it seems incomprehensible that a $12 billion project could collapse over less than $100 million. Did Fisher, publicity-shy and risk-averse, get cold feet?

“I don’t think he got cold feet,” says Hanson, the mayor’s chief of staff. “I think he got an accountant.”

This is the part of the story that is both the least well-sourced and the most potentially fascinating: Fisher fell in love with the Howard Terminal site and only later realized that spending billions of dollars to develop a mixed-use neighborhood and a baseball stadium on a largely inaccessible stretch of waterfront was kind of nuts, even if he was getting close to a billion dollars in public money to grease the skids. Former Oakland councilmember Ignacio De La Fuente minces absolutely no words in his appearance in the article:

The city commissioned a study on seven potential ballpark sites in 2001, and De La Fuente, the former councilmember, says, “The most difficult, undoable, f—ing expensive site was Howard Terminal. From the beginning I said that site was bulls—. Total bulls—.”

One of the other sites, of course, was the Oakland Coliseum site, but Fisher continues to dismiss that out of hand:

Fisher says the Coliseum site, despite its endless parking lots and access to public transit, is not suited to be the “ballpark village” concept that allows for walk-up ticket sales and appeals to businesses such as bars and restaurants.

“To be able to attract the 2.4 million fans that we were hoping to attract here for our stadium, it had to be great,” Fisher says. “It had to be at least as good, if not better, than Oracle field in San Francisco. And I also felt like, why should our fans settle for anything else? Our fans deserve a great ballpark, and that was always my North Star.”

That’s clearly eyewash, but it does raise the question, yet again, of why Fisher hates the Coliseum site so much. (ESPN says he needs to belittle it now to show MLB that he is out of options in Oakland so he can get his Vegas move approved, but that’s a different question than why he hates it in the first place.) Is it just because it’s not new, in a way that he can lay claim to as his own personal vision? That it lacks any cranes to climb to look around at the view? It really is the strangest part of this whole story, especially when Fisher first glommed onto one pricey alternative at Howard Terminal, and then ended up with:

It became clear that Fisher traded his 55-acre legacy development, one with a stunning design by world-famous Danish architect Bjarke Ingels that included a community park built right on top of the ballpark, one with the residential and commercial real estate, a city within the city, for nine acres in the parking lot of the Tropicana in Las Vegas, a project Oakland officials have derisively dubbed “Fisher’s putt-putt course.” …

“To see this blow up in Oakland for really no reason and then to hear how little they have in Vegas is mind-blowing,” says Hanson. “When they said they had a signed deal, a binding deal, I thought, ‘Holy s—, they’ve been playing us all along.’ But then to see this nine-acre parking lot … what? You walked away from us for that? Not to be a jilted lover, but God is she ugly.”

Kaval replies that the Tropicana site is “the busiest intersection in the West” with more “cars, people, eyeballs” and “one of the most exciting and iconic locations for a sports venue in the world, because we’re there,” all of which is sort of true even if that “because we’re there purple monkey dishwasher” remark is a little weird. None of it really answers, though, why Fisher and Kaval are looking at trying to build a $1.5 billion domed stadium on a nine-acre parcel that almost certainly cannot fit a domed stadium and doesn’t even have any giant cranes to climb; Keown says he spent 75 minutes interviewing Fisher, but I guess either he didn’t get around to asking that or Fisher didn’t answer.

Then there’s this, which lands in the middle of the article but really might as well serve as its conclusion:

To hear Oakland officials tell it, this is the tale of a risk-averse billionaire owner who chose the riskiest project possible, one that required nearly $1 billion in public funding for on-and off-site infrastructure, and then walked away when the finish line was in sight.

Fisher and Kaval would disagree, obviously, but that really does look like what’s going on here. Which makes no sense from a business standpoint, but from a failson logic angle, “I’m gonna go find a city that really says it loves me!” is 100% on point. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: Just because you’re a billionaire doesn’t mean you’re smart or even smart about how to make money, and Fisher seems to be bidding for a place in the Cutting Off Your Nose to Spite Your Face Hall of Fame.

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31 comments on “Liveblogging that ginormous ESPN article about how the A’s picked Las Vegas

  1. And if there is anyone who could be trusted to write 7k words and get no closer to the truth, it’s ESPN.

  2. I can certainly understand why Oakland feels the way it does about Fisher. If you’ve watched his clowncar operation “develop” it’s really hard to think anything else.

    That said, while they are right that their portion of the HT project was “near” the finish line, I think they are overlooking the obvious:

    That the relatively modest amount of money Fisher would have had to put in was still too much for him.

    Lew Wolff said the same thing as de la Fuente regarding HT. It just wasn’t feasible in any way, even if the land and servicing was essentially free. For whatever reason, Fisher thought he knew better. And discovered, not for the first time I would imagine, that inheriting a lot of money doesn’t make you right or smart.

    The really dumb thing is that there is enough money on the table to MORE than build a new stadium at the current site (yes, I am assuming that Oakland would offer a similar amount – though probably not the full $800m – to rebuild at the coliseum… I think they would). And there isn’t enough money coming from LV to build at the site he has had chosen for him (via discount, of course) – even if you account for the continued revenue sharing stream he will suck up in Vegas.

    The only way this makes sense is if the whole LV drive was done because the dynamic duo believed that Oakland would cave and pay for everything (and a pony) for Fisher to stay. I don’t think that was ever a consideration for Oakland regardless who was mayor on or council. It sure isn’t now.

    If he moves, practically all of Fisher’s RS money will go to servicing debt on the stadium build in Las Vegas (unless he finds some way to offload that onto someone else). He is moving to a much smaller market with much lower potential in order to make less money, even accounting for the subsidy MLB appears to have promised him (and based on market size, he should qualify for it).

    But he’ll still be dramatically worse off than he would in a new bare bones $500m stadium at the coliseum site in Oakland.

    If that isn’t a textbook case of stupid I don’t know what is.

    1. In 2018 financing and investment partners for Bay Area real estate was cheap and easy. However, instead of focusing on coming to the best compromise of a deal as quickly as possible (like he was forced to in Vegas timingwise — His $500M request dropped to $380M right away), they chose to nickel and dime, change the goalposts, and generally be absolutely impossible to work with. My sources say there were requests (or more accurately demands) almost daily and they were constantly sold as “do it because we say so”. They were acting with such a level of entitlement that they never imagined the world and markets were going to change overnight.

      That said there are reportedly multiple ownerships who want into the MLB so bad they’d cash finance the project OR at least finance it from a much stronger position under better terms (hello: Joe Lacob). MLB does NOT want an owner who will privately finance and go deep into the luxury tax because that’s not the business model it wants. Fans or cities be damned.

      1. And yet they just created a special tax bracket for the Mets new superspending self financing ex con owner.

  3. So I’m going to push back on HT being inaccessible. It has 2 BART stations within a mile (both closer to BART than Oracle Park is). Last mile transit could/would improve to support the development. I love your work but the comment about inaccessibility is way off base, so much so off base that I would consider an edit.

    1. It’s a pain to get to. (As is Jack London Square, honestly.) “Largely inaccessible” is a fair description, no matter how many BART stations are just across the train tracks and the highway.

        1. Hold up.
          BART as a feeder to Muni Metro is to public transportation sportsball facilities (SF) as peanut butter is to jelly

        2. Lots of people do. The crowds walking up 2nd to get to the stadium from Market are thick on gamedays.

      1. Have any of these people walked a mile in the dark from 12th Street under the freeway? It wasn’t great in 2018, and now it’s folly.

        The whole point of the downtown ballpark is for people to get together after work, and good luck with that in OAK now. A bunch of restaurant owners just started a safety campaign to help with burglaries and car break-ins. And don’t tell me 30000 people are coming on Capital Corridor or the magic peoplemover. Or ferries, from where? And for how much?

        HT was pie in the sky 5 years ago, now it’s lunacy.

        1. Yes, I’ve walked that a million times but to your point, I haven’t since going to the video game bar when the Nats closed out the World Series (i.e. well pre-Covid). That said; Broadway down to JLS is a wide corridor that would be heavily policed on game nights with large crowds of people moving. The Coliseum BART station site is in a gnarly neighborhood but heavy police presence (both BART police and OPD) makes issues exceedingly rare. The hope is a well executed project plan could include good security as well as just an overall lift to the area (like in the China Basin).

          And again, Fisher is broke and out but there are others who would step right in. My hope is Oakland is able to trade a lease extension for a conditional expansion franchise and then the city and prospective owners would be free to put their money where their mouth is.

          The flipside is the city and the A’s of raised all this infrastructure that is still on the table stadium or not so hopefully another awesome project can take advantage of that.

      2. Who considers BART as a means of transportation to BART? Pretty much everybody. It’s very heavily trafficked by Giants fans. Jump on a train at Embarcadero station after a game and it packed black and orange to the gills. I would venture that greater than 50% of people coming from the East Bay to a Giants came come on BART (or ferry). That’s Jeremy Aguero level math based on the fact that I take BART or the ferry as do 100% of the people I attend games with from the East Bay (none of them drive). Super scientific, I know but I think you’ll get Bay Area people agreeing with me on that.

        Don’t forget that when Oracle opened China Basin was empty and between BART and the stadium was pretty run down and sketchy. They made sure there was police presence. The stadium and it’s ensuing development ended up completely transforming the area. In fact, everything (and I mean everything) used to denigrate the HT site access-wise could have been said about the China Basin site when it opened. That’s the hope for Oakland in a deal like this. I still want it privately financed. That’s not up for debate.

        1. That’s not exactly true. Most of SoMa was built out by the time the Giants’ stadium was built, and while the stadium certainly helped extend the redeveloped area down to the bay, it didn’t transform anything that wasn’t already transforming.

          Yes, lots of people take BART to get to the N-Judah, as do I when I’m in town. But taking the BART to Embarcadero and then walking is not a terrific option, and that’s without a highway and an Amtrak line to cross.

          If Fisher or Lacob or Lex Luthor or somebody eventually decides to build at Howard Terminal, more power to them, and I’ll certainly go to games there. But the idea that it’s a great place for a stadium and surrounding development while the Coliseum property isn’t is one part crane fetish and one part moral panic.

          1. SoMa was but there was a bit of a wasteland between SoMa and China Basin. It wasn’t bad per se, not like Oakland level bad, but it looked nothing like it does today. I remember street parking being fairly easy in that no man’s land the one time I drove and didn’t take BART it’s first year open.

            I walk from Powell St straight down 3rd or 4th. There are tons and tons of people doing the same walk; it’s just a 20 minute walk. From Embarcadero it’s a quick Muni ride also, tons of gameday service running back and forth. I’d expect buses from West Oakland BART and heavy policing down Broadway for pedestrian access.

            How do you picture people from the East Bay getting to Oracle currently if not the ways I mentioned above?

          2. If Muni Metro existed in Oakland and ran to Howard Terminal, then the two sites would be more comparable.

            You seem to think that the main concern people have about getting to a ballgame (or to their apartments) is police protection. That’s not my experience of how the world works.

    2. Nope, can’t agree that it’s off base. If you have to consider financing absurdities like the proposed gondola, AND STILL worry about your car and foot traffic interacting with freight trains, you have an accessibility problem. BART runs directly to the Coliseum, Amtrak runs right by there to also service the airport. If you want to pick up a noticeable amount of fans coming via ferry, when most of those people will already have easier access and firmer loyalty to the Giants, you’re going to have to dial up the team to championship dynasty or Bash Bros level fast, and keep it there… something Fisher is unlikely to do after blowing his wad on a stadium, see San Jose Earthquakes.

      If you’re thinking about the team as the central business, rather than just one bullet point in a grandiose real-estate scheme, you’ve got to think about where you’re going to rebuild the fanbase from, especially picking back up the marginal fans who have to make more of an effort to get to a game. The Peninsula and Marin County are very likely going to stick with the Giants. Amtrak can surely get you back a few Bay Area expats from Sacramento, which has definitely been a trend in the last few years. But the bulk of the fans that have gone missing are going to come via BART and freeway from the East Bay suburbs and exurbs; a wise team owner would be considering San Joaquin County and as far out as Modesto as part of the marketing territory that needs to be built back up.

      My family is one among many that made the migration from the East Bay to the farther exurbs during the past 30 years. Whenever we’ve gone to see Major League Baseball lately, the Coliseum has always been a far and away better experience than Oracle/AT&T despite usually offering a worse home team, because it’s easier for us to get to. My stepdad is mobility-impaired, and I’m willing to assert him as an important representative example because, oh by the way, doesn’t MLB have the oldest-skewing fanbase of any of the major sports? There’s going to be a lot of league-wide fanbase rebuilding on the back of kids going to games with their grandparents!

      So let me walk you through it: Going to the Coliseum gives us our choice of either driving all the way or picking up Dublin/Pleasanton BART where it’s usually not an issue finding space for his mobility scooter. Going to see the Giants means forget about driving, take BART all the way, then negotiate the transfer to a much more cramped Muni train. Going to Howard Terminal would mean forget about driving after the first painful experience getting into downtown Oakland and across the railroad tracks, transfer off BART to the f***ing gondola (LOL, LMAO), or burn scooter battery that he might need inside the ballpark getting down the street from BART, while also possibly dodging a freight train or Amtrak.

      Howard Terminal has always meant destroying the accessibility advantage that the A’s have over the Giants for East Bay and exurban fans. The issues I’ve outlined wouldn’t be dealbreakers quite as big for more able-bodied fans, but even for them, it begs the question… why not spend 10 more minutes on BART for a similar walk to the stadium? Especially since the Giants have a vastly better track record over the last decade. At this point, the A’s would need every advantage to overcome that simple truth. If, by some twist of fate, this neverending story winds its way back to Oakland after all, Howard Terminal needs to be totally off the table.

      1. It’s impossible to deny that the Coliseum is the most accessible site. I’m not trying to say that. However, it’s not a proposed stadium site so you really can’t compare it apples to apples with HT. The HT situation today is analogous to the China Basin site 25 years ago, except HT already has Jack London square.

        1. If we can only compare sites John Fisher is willing to consider, we can only compare HT to HT. Even on that basis, it doesn’t come off as either a good idea or a good investment.

          HT is not China Basin.

        2. My point is that the people proposing stadium sites are idiots, and trying to justify their idiocy is pointless.

  4. It also has Amtrak and Ferry terminal adjacent. Sorry those were an afterthought to me and even more a reason to walk back the inaccessibility comment.

  5. “Just your typical LOLAthletics stuff here”

    Can we add #LOLAS into the FOS Manual Of Style ?

        1. No, but I didn’t want to have to spend time answering questions in the comments about “Who’s Lola?”

  6. “Fisher fell in love with Howard Terminal”
    Sometimes Daddies love Mommies very, very much (HT)
    But not as much as comped out hookers & blow (LV)

    FIFY SI

  7. Fisher explaining that the reason he doesn’t spend on the Earthquakes is because the brand new pitch he was gifted by SJ is already outdated was perhaps the most telling part. Once you feed a wild billionaire they become accustomed to it and they will keep coming back for more. Lost Wages beware.

    1. Err – my mistake. The Earthquakes stadium was built by Lew Wolff. Still – there is no way Fisher is ever going to spend money on a team. There will always be a reason not to.

        1. Don’t forget the tremendous success of the Golden Baseball League (and his time attempting to do economics for the Bush (43) administration… oh boy.)

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