Oakland A's move to San Jose is dead

[mikecubs]

Supreme Court rejects San Jose appeal over Athletics' move

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal from the city of San Jose in its bid to lure baseball's Athletics from Oakland to the South Bay.

The justices on Monday left in place lower court rulings that dismissed the city's antitrust claims against Major League Baseball, which blocked the Athletics' contemplated move to San Jose.

San Jose sued MLB in June 2013 for conspiring to block the relocation. San Jose is in Santa Clara County, part of the San Francisco Giants' territory under MLB's constitution. The city said the territory rules violated federal antitrust laws. Baseball has been exempt from antitrust laws since a 1922 Supreme Court decision.

"The court's decision, while significant, has no impact on our intense and unwavering focus on solving our ballpark issue and providing A's fans the first-class experience they deserve," A's owner Lew Wolff said in a statement.

Wolff has been committed to building a new ballpark and leaving the rundown Oakland Coliseum. The A's averaged 21,829 fans a game this year, 27th among the 30 big league teams.

"Listen, it'd be great to have a new facility," said Billy Beane, the A's executive vice president of baseball operations. "The facts are the facts. We do our best with what we have."

Major League Baseball declined to comment on the court's decision.

Giants CEO Larry Baer didn't want to address the ruling specifically other than to say: "We support the A's getting a new ballpark. We've said that before."

San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo suggested the city was moving on without the A's and a new stadium close to downtown and would turn its attention to developing the areas.

"We knew going into this litigation that getting a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court would be a long shot -- the Court hears only a couple dozen out of the more than 2,000 petitions it receives each year," Liccardo said.

Liccardo noted that the city didn't spend any money on legal fees fighting the issue in court. Private lawyers who represented the city were to get paid only if they won in court.

Oakland shortstop Marcus Semien, for one, didn't mind. He grew up in the East Bay in nearby El Cerrito.

"That's great. This is where I grew up," he said Monday while cleaning out his locker at the Oakland Coliseum. "I grew up here in the East Bay and feel this is home. This is home for the A's."

The case is San Jose v. Major League Baseball, 14-1252.

espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/13813826/supreme-court-rejects-san-jose-appeal-oakland-athletics-move

[mikecubs]

Not a surprise. It's now Oakland or bust.

[wolfmannick]

With San Jose dead, where will the A's go if they can't get a new stadium built in Oakland? Not a lot of candidates left on the list in the area.

[mikecubs]

They'd probably rot in the Coliseum indefinitely. I think the big key will be

1. The Raiders have to leave for either LA or Santa Clara
2. I think MLB may have to agree to keep the A's on revenue sharing until the ballpark is paid off. My guess is the A's argue they are not a top 15 market since unlike other shared markets they can't build a park where ever they want. All they have rights to are east bay.

[mikecubs]

MANFRED: I WANT THE A’S TO STAY IN OAKLAND

Look, there’s little point to writing about San Jose. Other than the antitrust lawsuit, San Jose hasn’t been a player in the A’s stadium discussions for at least a year. I haven’t written about it much, yet I’m supposed to be San Jose’s greatest champion. Mayor Sam Liccardo appears ready to move on. The A’s may control some of the land into the future in case Oakland somehow screws the pooch. Absent that, all eyes should be focused on Oakland, the A’s, and unfortunately, the Raiders. We’ll know more about how the Raiders actions affect the A’s in due course.

No, I wanted to wait until I heard from the person who’s eventually going to drive this effort, if for no other reason than pent-up frustration. That man would be Commissioner Rob Manfred, courtesy of the LA Times’ Bill Shaikin. Shaikin got an A’s question in with the Commish today, and Manfred put it in no uncertain terms.

Shaikin: On Monday, the Supreme Court declined to hear San Jose’s appeal of its lawsuit against MLB. You had said you would not hold any discussions with San Jose about its interest in building a ballpark for the Athletics so long as the city was suing the league. Now that the suit is done, would you talk with San Jose, or do you want the A’s to stay in Oakland?

Manfred: I want the A’s to stay in Oakland. It’s a very fundamental policy of baseball. We favor franchise stability. I think it is possible to get a stadium done in Oakland, and that remains my preference.

That’s the most public support Oakland has gotten from a pro sports commissioner in 25 years. It’s meaningful. Most importantly, it’s a message to both the A’s and Oakland to git er done. Manfred has already mentioned pushing the A’s to do more on their own. This very visible support for Oakland is a way for Manfred to say to Oakland, I believe in you, now take this goodwill and do something with it.

Okay, but When? you ask. Well, if I’m going by how the A’s and the City of Oakland operate, I suspect things can start to go public in either November or December. The A’s have done past stadium presentations and info releases in November, clear of the World Series and around the busy fall/winter meetings timeframe. The City of Oakland seems to prefer dropping info in December, right before City Hall goes on recess.

The road to getting a stadium deal done is a long one. Thankfully, many of the process steps have already been done. There’s no need for a new EIR if, as Lew Wolff desires, a new A’s ballpark eventually replaces the Coliseum as the only stadium in the complex. The one tangible benefit from the Coliseum City debacle is a certified plan for the land in and around the Coliseum, which should streamline the process for a third venue. The only thing holding up matters, much to Manfred’s chagrin, is the Raiders.

Manfred would love for the A’s to be more proactive in making a deal. He’d also love for Oakland to kick the Raiders to the curb, but we all know the City is not going to do that first. Oakland would much rather let the NFL make a decision for them. Since that decision could come in only four months, there’s no real harm in waiting. The A’s have a lease for several more years, so they don’t have to rush.

And if I’m Lew Wolff, I want to have some idea what the future holds for the A’s via the collective bargaining agreement, the current version of which is set to expire after next season. It would behoove Wolff to show enough progress on the stadium front to convince Manfred and the Lodge to support some form of financial backstop for the team, whether via extended revenue sharing or a stadium loan. While there is no NFL-style G-4 stadium loan infrastructure for MLB teams, there is a league credit facility that can provide up to $100 million for various operating costs. As for a cap on revenue sharing, there is this entry I keep forgetting to cite from the current CBA:

(10) The “Base Plan” shall be a 34% straight pool plan… For purposes of the Base Plan in the 2012 Revenue Sharing Year only, the Miami Marlins’ Net Local Revenue will be $100 million.

Basically, local revenue above that $100 million mark would’ve been exempt from revenue sharing (paying 34% of it into the pool), though I’m not sure that the Marlins actually reached $100 million local revenue that year. In any case, the language and mechanism are there to support such a request. That’s important, though not so much for the initial years of the stadium and the expected honeymoon effect, but for later years when the effect wears off. Look at the two teams with the newest ballparks, the Marlins and Twins. Neither became huge successes when their parks opened, allowing revenue sharing to be a welcome safety net for both despite heavy public subsidies. The A’s should be given the same treatment from MLB, provided that it sunsets in a reasonably short period, say, for the length of the next CBA. After all, the A’s were given a sunset provision for revenue sharing in the current CBA, which would’ve kicked in if they opened a ballpark between 2011 and 2016.

People tend to remember stadium drives for groundbreaking ceremonies and impactful city council votes. But it’s all about the process, having a good working relationship, and the team and city presenting a united front. We know that Oakland is where the commish wants the ballpark to be. We know that the current atmosphere in City Hall is more hospitable to the A’s than it has been in previous administrations. It’s going to take a while to settle the land issues, to get the various details right. There is a recipe for a successful ballpark deal. It won’t happen overnight. If you have any hang-ups about Oakland or Lew Wolff and John Fisher, best to leave them at the door. They’re the dealmakers, like it or not.

newballpark.org/2015/10/07/manfred-i-want-the-as-to-stay-in-oakland/