MLB season delayed

I detest the increasing interleague games. Play six against your geographic *rival* and six against another team on a rotating basis. The rest should be against your league, with more divisional games and more against other AL or NL teams. I could care dick all about seeing the Yankees play the Brewers in some June weekday games.

The more baseball changes, the more it fucks itself.

 

I've never understood the belief that a team would do well in Portland, and I used to live there.

 

IIRC, Portland's long-standing PCL team was run out of town to remake the stadium for MLS.

 

Do the Mariners have a fan base in Portland? If so, I’d think they wouldn’t be too happy.

 

Agreed. I just don't think Portland is a viable long-term option. However, was thinking about it afterward and other viable cities in the Pacific Time Zone might be Vancouver or Las Vegas.

I'm of the growing opinion that the A's could actually punt Oakland and either fight the Giants over the rights to San Jose or better yet, move out to Sacramento. Having driven through the Valley two falls ago, I was stunned at the growth there. You're talking about dropping from a top-five to top-30 media market, but you'd be able to cultivate an untapped market plus stay close enough to serve whatever existing fan base would be willing to jump on 80.

 

Never said I wanted to add two more franchises. That’s in addition to this losing the wild-card playoff, which has added enormous interest to September baseball.

Portland isn’t a huge baseball town, and Nashville is a major financial center along with the music industry (which is more than just “country music and Paramore”). Nashville also has a built-in brand identity for a franchise that would choose to end its longstanding stadium-site issues by moving there, although the Sounds’ current logo and brand styling aren’t particularly interesting and need some vintage tweaking.

 

The A's fought for, and lost, a battle to build a park near the SAP Center. They seem infatuated with a site in the shipyards now which would be an environmental and traffic disaster. Yet, they're about to buy the City of Oakland's share of the Coliseum (after getting Alameda County's share earlier) and that is absolutely the best place for them to build. Excellent freeway and transit access, and lots of room to build on with the Warriors and Raiders gone.

 

They just have to deal with the sewer issue and it will be all good. I get the urge to gentrify a hipster area (see China Basin across the bay), but when you have built in infrastructure, why leave? Getting in and out of the Coliseum is remarkably easy.

 

Until the Giants finally ditched decades of suck and Candlestick Park, the A's had a fighting (swingin'?) chance at developing a solid fan base in the East Bay, particularly Alameda, Contra Costa and northern Santa Clara counties -- all of whom are closer and have better transportation to and from the Coliseum site.

But the Giants were there first, have the bigger media rights, have a way cooler stadium and three championships this decade. The A's are playng a serious game of catch up and the whole "here's our stadium plan du jour" couldn't have helped matters any.

The Bay Area is definitely big enough for two teams. It's just the A's for much of their time in Oakland -- and despite beating the Giants for their fourth World Series championship since 1972 -- are always the supporting cast. The Coliseum was a terrible place to watch a game when I moved there in 1972. I can only imagine Al Davis' Great Wall of Empty Seats has made it worse. I've been to dozens of stadiums, and never sat as far from home plate as I have there.

A's fans deserve way better.

 

The Coliseum was way cooler before Mount Davis blocked the view of the Oakland hills.

 

For sure, A's deserve better. They also deserve an ownership that actually spends money on the team. It is really hard to get anything but a small group of hardcore fans when the minute you learn someone's name he's dealt to another team.

 

Should have clarified that any new stadium needs to deal with the sewer issue. It's a given that the monstrosity that Big Al built needs to come down.