Latest updates on Oakland A’s stadium plans, Las Vegas move

While Major League Baseball typically shares a tentative schedule for next season with teams at the start of each year, the Oakland A's were supposed to have determined by the end of December where they would play in 2025 and beyond before moving to Las Vegas in 2028. That didn't happen. The mid-January deadline has passed. Soon, a target for the end of January will also be set.

Even after the A's reached a deal to leave Oakland permanently, the franchise's near-term future remains in limbo. It's not just about MLB's low payroll or the lack of significant improvement from a team that went 50-112 last year. It's something as basic as not having a home after their lease with the Oakland Coliseum expires after this season.

Here's what you need to know about the current status of the A's stadium plans, according to several people involved in the process of finding the team a home.

What is delaying the decision?

It's pretty simple: local television money. The A's contract with Comcast to broadcast their games on NBC Sports Bay Area calls for the team to receive about $70 million next year, sources said. But if the A's aren't in Oakland, the regional sports network no longer has to pay the rights. The delicate balance between maximizing TV money and securing temporary housing is complicated by the strict nature of the Comcast deal. Even playing at a Triple-A park in Sacramento, about 85 miles northeast of Oakland, would not be covered under the A's current contract.

Already, the move to Las Vegas will move the A's from the 10th television market to the 40th. Clearly, TV money was a secondary consideration in choosing a permanent move. But a temporary deal, even if the A's negotiate a new deal with Comcast or another regional sports network, could be a fraction of what they currently stand to receive. This conundrum – and Comcast's influence – is creating a solution.

What are the most likely options?

The two cities at the top of the list, according to sources: Sacramento, home of the San Francisco Giants' Triple-A affiliate, and Salt Lake City, which would love to use the A's as proof of concept that it warrants expansion. franchise in the future.

Both cities have NBA franchises that regularly sell out all of their home games. Sacramento is the 20th largest TV market, while Salt Lake City is 27th. Sacramento offers a simpler short-term solution — Mayor Darrell Steinberg told the San Francisco Chronicle he's “over the moon about the possibility” — while Salt Lake City is, for MLB, the longer-term play .

Sutter Health Park in Sacramento can accommodate more than 10,000 people – and, with standing tickets and lawn seating, can go up to 14,000. The Salt Lake ownership group, which previously controlled the Utah Jazz, is building a new Triple-A stadium for 2025 in South Jordan, Utah, seating up to 11,000 people.

While Sacramento had previously shown no aspiration to bring MLB to town, Salt Lake City expressed its desire effusively. After A's officials recently visited the city to assess its viability, Big League Utah, the group at the heart of Salt Lake City's efforts, erected seven billboards around town that read: “UTAH WANTS THEM HAS “.

If the A's landed in Sacramento, they could renegotiate their deal with NBC Sports Bay Area, which broadcasts Kings games. If they moved to Salt Lake City, sources say, the team could work out a new deal, but since that TV territory is currently owned by the Arizona Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies, that would add an extra level of negotiation.

Could they stay in Oakland?

Potentially, although it's unlikely. The A's own 50 percent of the Coliseum – and the city of Oakland, still angered by the A's departure, owns the other half. The team and the city haven't spoken in 10 months, sources said, and so if a conversation about extending the three-year lease were to occur, it would be at the A's request.

The situation will truly be a litmus test of how much A's owner John Fisher is willing to do for money. Staying in Oakland would mean going hat in hand to politicians who find his actions repugnant and negotiating with them. That would mean inviting constant chants to sell the team — the kind of thing that could happen in Sacramento and certainly wouldn't in Salt Lake City. This would mean a new almost daily challenge to a decision that a number of powerful men in sport still consider to be short-sighted and erroneous.

At some point, cutting the cord makes perfect sense. And the expiration of the stadium lease seems like the right time.

Why don't they just move to Las Vegas?

Using Triple-A Summerlin Park — about a dozen miles from the A's stadium site, in the former Tropicana Hotel on Las Vegas Boulevard — is one option, although it wouldn't exactly constitute the splash that the A's are looking for their move to Vegas.

There is precedent. The Washington Nationals spent their first three seasons at RFK Stadium while Nationals Park was under construction. But showing up to a new city in a minor league park with a miserable team isn't high on the A's priority list and makes Las Vegas, at least for now, a long shot for 2025- 2027.

Will they arrive in Vegas by 2028?

Reaching an agreement on the stadium took a lot of work and lobbying. Building the stadium by 2028 depends on staying on schedule, something the A's aren't exactly adept at. With $380 million in public money earmarked to fund the $1.5 billion stadium project, a group called Schools Over Stadiums is pushing for a referendum that would put to a vote the use of taxpayer dollars. If shovels don't break ground by early 2025, sources say, it's questionable whether the A's will actually be ready to debut off the Strip by 2028.

What will the A's look like when they go to Vegas?

In their proposal to the MLB relocation community, the A's suggested that by the time they arrive in Vegas, they could have a payroll in the range of $170 million, as first reported times The Athletic. This is an organization whose largest Opening Day payroll was $92.2 million in 2019.

Is it possible that with less TV revenue and a portal limited by approximate size, a team would nearly double its highest payroll and more than triple its current payroll over the next three seasons? Of course. Is this likely? Clearly no. As much as the A's will save money by not funding projects to gauge where they will spend their future, the idea that the team will spend the next three years in a temporary location, without a big-time TV deal, with a portal revenues limited by stadium size and somehow beginning to support a mid-level payroll requires a leap of faith that even the most ardent fan wouldn't take.