How Do You Fire an Owner?
The first thing to know about being a sports fan is that there’s a lot of pain and anguish involved. As one of my favorite radio hosts used to say, rooting for a team is like signing up to get kicked in the nuts every year, except for those magical seasons when they win it all. It’s part of the contract. We craft part of our personality around being a fan of a team. Hoping, cheering, praying, agonizing, cursing, believing in them season after season. All for a one-in-thirty chance of witnessing a championship, nearly the same odds as a roulette wheel.
So we accept that. Because in the dry spells between champagne floods, there are always memorable moments. No-hitters, mammoth home runs, impossible diving catches. There’s the excitement of a new prospect or big trade or free-agent signing. The thrill of a playoff chase, game sevens and improbable late-inning comebacks. There are players who spend most, if not all, of their careers in one city and are heroes to a whole generation of fans. Tony Gwynn in San Diego. Joey Votto in Cincinnati. Ryan Zimmerman in Washington. There’s always something to bring us to the park.
But sports also have a habit of hurting us. Not the typical ups and downs of being a fan. I’m talking the lasting damage these emotionless corporations inflict in the ruthless quest to claw every available dollar. I know that sports teams are businesses owned (mostly) by business people. And the bottom line is important. But so is the quality of your product. So is the way you treat your employees and customers.
The most obvious example is the Oakland A’s of the John Fisher era. In any other arena, he would have been removed years ago. Instead, without taking any responsibility for the current mess his team has become, he’s getting his billionaire’s club to approve a move to Las Vegas, complete with prime real estate on the strip and a… wait… a 30,000 seat stadium!? How is that not an immediate red flag. The Dodgers are putting 50,000 butts in the seats on a Tuesday night, and your plan for this “exciting sports town” is to limit yourself to 30,000 high-priced seats.
"The secret sauce to Las Vegas is you have the tourists. Those people can come in and spend big dollars. You create a business model that's resilient and powerful." - Dave Kaval, A’s President
Do you even plan on building a winning team and trying to fill, I don’t know, maybe 40,000 seats during the playoffs?
How does Major League Baseball look at what’s become of Oakland and think, “well, things will be better once we trick some taxpayers to build him a shiny new ballpark.” The Giants, Warriors and 49ers all managed to build a stadium in the Bay Area primarily through private equity. There’s no question the A’s could have a ballpark in the Bay Area if they really wanted to. Look at all the proposals from the last two decades. San Jose. Fremont. On the existing site. Laney College, Oakland. Howard Terminal. What’s the common denominator in all these failed projects? The ownership group, and these billionaire’s insistence on spending as little of their own money as possible.
His final half-decade in Oakland he took a promising young team that was turning into a perennial playoff contender and either sold them off for lotto tickets or just let them walk completely. Has anyone ever seen a story that included the words “Oakland A’s offer extension”? It was like having a core of Matt Olson, Matt Chapman and Marcus Semien was an inconvenience. Something that delayed his plan to basically delete the Oakland A’s from existence. (All three are now important pieces of winning baseball teams this season).
He tore this latest roster down to the studs. Actually, deeper than that. He went to the bedrock, dug that up and filled it in with quicksand so that nothing good could ever be built here again.
He took that route and, in the same offseason, raised ticket prices. In 2022, the team’s payroll was $48,443,000, down 50.9% from their 2019 price tag. In 2022, the average price of a ticket was $32.56, up 34% from 2019 numbers. Of course fans are going to stay home. That’s what the team wants.
And guess who looks like the assholes? Not the owner. The media and social media trolls feast on these pictures of the vast desert of empty Coliseum seats and laugh at the announced attendance figures. They call Oakland a worthless team with shitty fans and an even worse stadium.
How is the narrative not 100%, full-force on how negligent, greedy and just plain awful the ownership group is. Payroll is $48mil when every team starts out with $100mil in revenue from various leaguewide media deals. The stadium, or, you know, John Fisher’s place of business, is a baseball field in name only. Sewage backups, rodent infestations, power outages. You’re a billionaire and you can’t find a good plumber? My house is nearly as old as the Coliseum and prone to some of the same issues that plague Oakland. But I call a professional and have it repaired (usually after failing miserably at doing it myself). I guess the pro way is to let it fall into total disrepair and let other counties bid to have me move there into a brand new home.
How does every other Major League Owner not look at what’s going on in Oakland and feel embarrassed? You can argue that all 29 other teams are either trying to win or at least attempting to build a winner. Most franchises also try to modernize their facilities every so often. Every offseason there are stories of renovations to benefit fans and players alike. The Blue Jays just found $300million to upgrade the 34-year-old Rogers Centre (below). The A’s biggest moves this millennium have been the continued growth of the broadcast booth passel of possums and moving from one old Spring Training complex to another one a few miles down the road while every other Cactus League team has either a brand new facility or has undergone major upgrades.
It’s not time for the A’s to move. It’s time for the A’s to move on. Get rid of John Fisher. Find an ownership group who can make Northern California work. The only people who can prevent this now are the 29 other majority owners. They need to realize that the best thing for the business’ long-term health is a stable and competent team in Oakland.
The Oakland A’s aren’t just a baseball team. Families and friends have built lasting connections with the help of summers in Oakland. The players by and large all fall in love with the fanbase. It’s why they keep coming back for reunions and anniversaries, and they all speak lovingly of their times in the clubhouse and with the fans. They’re woven into the community now. Ripping them out of Oakland is going to be just as painful to the franchise as it is to the fans. They’re going to be strangers in a strange land. A team that left its soul behind for the promise of fortune. They’re going to learn fast that Vegas is not the home that Oakland is. And Vegas is going to lament that $500,000,000 handout for years.
The East Bay is closing in on four generations of dedicated fandom and their reward has been a kick in the nuts. Before they go, someone needs to line up Fisher, Dave Kaval and Rob Manfred and give them a nice parting kick to the groin.
