Know what I would love to do? Close my eyes, wake up in five years and see what became of the Oakland A’s grandiose plans.
The potentially unprecedented three-year, home away from home arrangement while they await the opening of their new ballpark in Las Vegas. The long-term extensions for homegrown players and investments in the free-agent market. The escalation of the payroll to levels that anyone who has paid attention to John Fisher’s nearly two decades of ownership will find difficult to comprehend.
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Forgive my skepticism, considering Fisher’s shameful departure from Oakland and Major League Baseball’s role as his willing accomplice. But I’ll believe the A’s are serious about winning when I see it.
According to a source briefed on their plans, the A’s project payrolls in the $130 to $150 million range during the ramp-up period before they move into their new park, then $170 million-plus once they are established in their fixed-roof stadium. Fisher’s personal mouthpiece, team president Dave Kaval, declined to confirm those numbers, but said, “we’re budgeting numbers we think are in the higher side of the league.”
The average major-league payroll last season, according to Spotrac, was $165.7 million. As salaries continue to rise, the “higher side”by 2028 should indeed be more than $170 million. For a franchise that opened last season with a major-league low $56.9 million payroll – and has not ranked in the top 15 in player salaries since 1994 – the numbers would be nothing short of transformative. And shocking.
“We expect to have a competitive payroll that is going to enable us to have the resources necessary to field a competitive team, year in and year out,” Kaval said in an interview Saturday. “We think that is necessary for the Vegas market.”
Blowing out payroll absolutely will be necessary, considering the A’s will require strong attendance from a fan base that includes tourists as well as locals. Their local media revenue is almost certain to decline, reflecting their move from the nation’s tenth largest Designated Market Area (DMA) to the 40th. Las Vegas will be the smallest media market in the majors, behind Milwaukee at No. 38.
But their permanent relocation is still four years away.
In the interim, the A’s will spend one more depressing season in Oakland. Their home city – or cities – in the three seasons after that have yet to be determined. But unless the A’s play at their Triple A park in Summerlin, Nev., within the city limits of Las Vegas, they essentially will be vagabonds from 2025 to ‘27.
Remember the 1976 movie, “The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings”? Meet John Fisher’s Traveling No-Stars.
Oh, but this gets better.
If the A’s play outside the Bay Area, a very real possibility unless they end up at Oracle Park, the Giants’ home stadium, or – gasp – remain at the dreaded Oakland Coliseum, they will lose their contract with their local television network, NBC Sports California. Under that deal, which runs through 2033, they received $67 million last season, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
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Sacramento, a city Kaval has acknowledged is outside the network’s contractual boundaries, is another potential option for the A’s, as is Salt Lake City. Both of those media markets are a good bit larger than Las Vegas – Sacramento ranks 20th, Salt Lake City 27th.
Perhaps the league could help arrange some type of creative TV package involving either of those cities plus Las Vegas and the Bay Area; The Chronicle has reported the A’s potentially could negotiate a lesser payout from NBC Sports California if it played in Sacramento. But what are the odds Fisher actually will walk away from a deal that paid him $67 million last year? Why should anyone expect him not to follow the money?
Kaval declined comment on what he called the “interim-play plan.” When I asked him if staying in Oakland was possible – a crazy thought if there ever was one, but maybe not so crazy if it yields the largest TV payout, he said, “We’re looking at all options. No options have been excluded at this time.”
Tell it to the Players Association, which surely will want to hear more, a lot more, if the A’s three-year sojourn includes stops at a gussied-up minor-league park in Summerlin, Sacramento or Salt Lake City. Tony Clark, the union’s executive director, said at the All-Star break the union would become involved if the A’s embarked upon such a plan, seeking clarity about playing conditions, travel, amenities and housing.
“Our concerns were tangible then and that remains the case now,” Clark said Sunday.
It is precisely during such an unsettling period when the A’s intend to ramp up competitively, following a standard blueprint teams use when preparing to move into a new park. Kaval, who grew up in Cleveland, cited the way the Indians – now the Guardians – built toward the opening of Jacobs – now Progressive – Field.
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The A’s are not exactly brimming with young talent – Baseball America in August ranked their farm system the seventh-worst in the majors. But Kaval said the expectation of superior resources in Las Vegas will enable them to keep rather than trade homegrown stars such as Matt Olson, Matt Chapman and Sean Murphy, to name three.
Second baseman Zack Gelof, who produced an .840 OPS in 300 plate appearances as a rookie last season, could be the kind of player the A’s lock up with an extension. Signing free agents while wandering through the baseball wilderness, a seemingly essential part of the equation if the team is going to field a $130 million payroll by 2026 or ‘27, presumably would be more of a challenge. And judging from Fisher’s nearly two decades as owner, why should anyone expect him to engage in deficit spending, parting with money he does not yet have?
Well, he had better, if he actually wants the A’s to succeed. In a media market as small as Las Vegas, the team will have no choice but to make strong attendance the foundation of its plan.
To hear Kaval tell it, the market already has proven it could support the NFL’s Raiders and NHL’s Golden Knights, so why not the A’s? “It’s not just like you’re something putting on pro forma in a business-school case,” Kaval said. “It’s rooted in examples that have been borne out in other sports.”
Kaval, though, is not comparing apples to apples.The Golden Knights, an expansion team, reached the Stanley Cup finals in their inaugural 2018 season, then won the Cup in ‘23. The Raiders have been less successful, but the NFL is by far the most popular sports league in the U.S. Every team’s home game is an event, one that occurs only eight or nine times during a regular season.
The A’s, to make their model work over 81 home dates, seemingly will be in win-or-else mode. But who’s to say Fisher will see it that way? It’s not as if he has shown an overwhelming desire to field a winning product. No one will confuse him with the Padres’ late Peter Seidler, among other, more aggressive owners.
Once the A’s are in Las Vegas, they surely will be worth more than Forbes’ latest valuation of $1.18 billion, perhaps even rising to the $2 billion range. The team, since Fisher became majority owner in 2005, has never ranked higher than 17th in payroll (in 2007), never spent more than $92.2 million on player salaries (in ‘19). But thanks to savvy management by Billy Beane and David Forst, over a 15-season span between 2006 and ‘20, it reached the postseason seven times.
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“We think it’s important for the success and business model of the club to invest resources in player operations and finally have the ability to keep these teams together and compete and hopefully win another World Series, or multiple ones,” Kaval said.
“We don’t have a problem getting the players and developing them. If you look around the league, especially (with so many former A’s) in the playoffs, that ain’t the problem. It’s how do we keep these guys? In this day and age, having players their career or most of their career in one place is a luxury. We’re hopeful that can be something we achieve in Las Vegas.”
Wake me up in five years. Let’s see what the Oakland-Transient-Las Vegas A’s look like then.
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Eno Sarris’ 2024 MLB starting pitcher fantasy rankings, with Stuff+ powered projections
(Top photo of A’s principal owner John Fisher: Michael Zagaris/Oakland Athletics/Getty Images)
