Oakland sports fans take another gut punch as A’s announce move to Las Vegas

The Oakland Athletics appear to have a stadium deal in place. Unfortunately for the city of Oakland, that stadium deal is in Las Vegas.

The city of Oakland just can’t catch a break. First, it was the Raiders. Then came the Golden State Warriors. Finally, the Oakland A’s have purchased their ticket out of town. It was announced on Wednesday that the Athletics have entered a binding agreement to buy a ballpark site in Las Vegas.

Now, anyone who’s been paying attention is not shocked by this news. There’ve been rumors for quite some time that the A’s have been looking to relocate the organization to Las Vegas. But after purchasing 49 acres of land west of the Las Vegas Strip, it appears that those rumors are now a reality.

Oakland sports fans are hurt again as A’s announce move to Las Vegas

While one obviously feels bad for the sports fans in the city of Oakland, this was a necessary move on the part of the Athletics franchise. There had been negotiations about a potential stadium deal with the city of Oakland, but those talks never materialized and Oak-Town will have now lost three professional sports teams in the span of five years.

The Golden State Warriors relocated to the Chase Center in San Francisco back in 2019. The Las Vegas Raiders moved to Sin City back in 2020 after efforts to renovate the Oakland Coliseum or build a new stadium never materialized. The Athletics are now following the Raiders to Las Vegas and Oakland will be left with two empty stadiums.

This is one of the two stadium deals that MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred is hoping to get in place. The other is the Tampa Bay Rays. The Rays released plans for a new stadium this past winter, but nothing has been finalized quite yet.

It’s a sad day in Oakland, but baseball fans in Las Vegas will be ready to welcome the A’s with open arms. The new stadium is said to seat over 30,000 and feature a partially retractable roof.