For baseball fans invested in the won-loss record of the Oakland A’s, the 2011-2012 offseason was depressing.
The team traded three former All Stars (pitchers Trevor Cahill, Gio Gonzalez and Andrew Bailey), acquired mostly prospects unfamiliar to the casual baseball fan, and basically said that winning was secondary to the franchise’s quest for a new ballpark in San Jose. Their home field in Oakland is considered to be a relic from a bygone era of multipurpose stadiums with poor sightlines and a far-too-large foul territory that keeps fans further away from the action than any other big league ballpark.
On top of the A’s purposeful decline into a team less likely to play winning baseball, they face division rivals in Anaheim and Texas completely dedicated to winning games. The Angels signed certain Hall of Famer Albert Pujols and ace pitcher C.J. Wilson in early December, while the Rangers are fresh off consecutive trips to the World Series and will take the field in 2012 with their roster largely intact.
Moneyball GM Billy Beane essentially threw in the towel on Christmas Eve when he said, “There wasn’t going to be a move we could make to compete with Texas and Anaheim. Just to come up to Seattle, we’d have to spend an extra $40-50 million.”
Instead, the A’s are trying to follow the roadmap of small market teams like the Cleveland Indians and Houston Astros who successfully timed the building of winning teams to the openings of Jacobs Field and Enron Field, respectively. This led to fantastic attendance spikes and World Series appearances for both franchises. The Indians even sold out more than 400 consecutive games starting with their first season in Jacobs Field.
The difference is that the Indians and the Astros knew their new ballparks would be built. By contrast, the A’s are held up by a territorial rights dispute with the Giants. Former A’s owner Walter Haas ceded any right to Santa Clara County in the early 1990s in order to help the Giants build a new stadium in the South Bay. The Giants lost that election in San Jose but retained the area’s territorial rights and claim to have used them to secure investors when they gained approval and financing for Pacific Bell Park in the late 1990s. The Giants are adamant that they will not harm their ownership group by surrendering the team’s rights to Santa Clara County.
And, of course, the Giants benefit greatly in terms of sponsorship dollars, TV/radio ratings and local interest if the A’s are weak.
While the baseball Commissioner’s Office sorts out that dispute, the A’s languish. Attempts since the team’s last playoff appearance in 2006 to capture lightening in a bottle by signing older free agents have not paid dividends on the field and have increased costs. The A’s reported a loss of between $1-2 million in 2011, even after receiving $30 million in revenue sharing checks from some of the wealthier big league teams. The current strategy is to trade away their most marketable players for other teams’ prospects and sacrifice any chance of a respectable record now for the hope of having those prospects mature into a competitive team for the potential 2015 opening of a so-far mythical new ballpark in San Jose.
So what is in it for the A’s current fans as they watch their team head towards 100 losses? Second baseman Jemile Weeks had an outstanding rookie year and as long as he has fewer than three years service will have to play for close to the major league minimum salary. He embodies the A’s ideal player. Starting pitcher Dallas Braden, who has a perfect game on his resume, is recovering from an arm injury, which makes him nearly impossible to trade. Catcher Kurt Suzuki has come close to making the American League All Star team a couple of times and as of the end of 2011 remains in the green and gold. Otherwise, fans can get behind the development of imported prospects and hope the San Jose stadium is approved before those players’ salaries rise to the point where they too become trade bait.
What the A’s do have going for them is a very attractive schedule with several glamour franchises visiting the Coliseum in 2012. The aging stadium will play host to the Yankees for two series, including Memorial Day weekend and has the Red Sox coming in for the Fourth of July. The Angels and Rangers will play three series in Oakland as division rivals, and interleague play will bring the Dodgers and Giants to the East Bay in June. For all its other flaws, the Coliseum is very convenient to BART, and it’s doubtful fans will have to fight large crowds for most contests as Oakland figures to finish near the bottom again in American League attendance.
So A’s fans can enjoy top quality opponents before intimate crowds with no pressure to buy tickets in advance except for maybe the Yankees, Red Sox and Giants games. If that formula is appealing, you are just the kind of fan that the A’s will draw in 2012.
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