Why isn’t Oakland pursuing MLB like Orlando?

Why isn’t Oakland pursuing MLB like Orlando?

Here’s Prody Brazil. Well, it certainly is a fascinating but also a frustrating study from the Northern California perspective when you have a look at two cities side by side and their direct relationship and pursuit of Major League Baseball. Obviously, Oakland had a team for 57 years. The A’s just departed for Sacramento, West Sacramento, and maybe Las Vegas. Who knows in the future? And then Orlando has never had a team, but right now there’s a group called the Dreamers. They are desperately pushing to try and put something together. They say it’s for expansion, but obviously and more likely it’s for trying to pursue an existing team to relocate to Central Florida. And yeah, the tortoise and the hair, they’re on your screen here because one city is moving very fast. The other one is taking its time or quite honestly not really even moving forward on anything at all. And that city is Oakland here in Northern California where I’m from. Major League Baseball at the Coliseum for 57 years. And for a lot of those years, under the right situations and ownership and promotion, it worked great. And then it kind of almost intentionally stopped working great in the last decade plus. This region is still ripe with investors and industry. If you’re asking me, can this area support two Major League Baseball teams? I think the proof has been in the pudding. When both franchises are at least jogging and not crawling, one of them has been sprinting in San Francisco. The other one in the East Bay for the last decade plus, the last decade of its existence was basically crawling like a baby and not even trying to compete at times with the product on and off the field. But this region, is it capable of supporting two teams that are generally speaking going in the right directions? Absolutely. And if the problem in Oakland was, hey, it’s the mayor. Hey, it’s the city council members. Hey, it’s politics. Well, guess what? City of Oakland has a new mayor. And for a large part has a brand new city council. So, that part has expired. If that was an excuse, Oakland has changed in those directions. But there is no official MLB push as far as I know, right? The city of Oakland lost the A’s, lost a couple other pro sports teams. There’s no group like the Orlando Dreamers that’s put together to say, “Hey, we’ve got investors. We’ve picked out this site. We’re working with the city. We’re making deals.” Even though baseball hasn’t approved a single thing, we’re already starting that groundwork. There is none of that going on in Oakland. And that’s kind of the frustrating factor here. Orlando, as I said before, has never been an MLB market. They haven’t even had a minor league team since 2003. And before that, they had a long history of different teams and affiliations and minor league baseball. But since 2003, not even a minor league team has played in Orlando. I’m not here to say they can’t support it. I’m just saying they don’t even have a track record of all right, this team does and draws well, and it’s a good business. It’s a good AAA team. They have nothing to speak of baseball-wise. Yeah, they’ve got entertainment. They’ve got theme parks. They’ve got a lot of other things. A big tourism industry, but nothing as it directly relates to like professional baseball in the last 20 plus years. This region too is ripe with investors and tourism and a lot of dollars and a lot of people coming through in the summer, but they are putting forth a full-scale push. They’re getting new offices. They’re hiring people. They’re uh lining up $2.5 billion, some of that for a stadium, some of it for a team. It’s just amazing what one city is doing without a team, and the other one who just had a team, who’s got all the evidence in the world they can support it, they’re doing nothing to try and at least put their name out there. So, what’s the same here? Well, right now, neither city has Major League Baseball. the A’s and Rays. If we’re talking about the most geographically convenient teams to try and pitch and lure and talk to and negotiate with and maybe steal, well, the A’s and Rays are still out there. They’ve yet to begin building new ballparks. Now, the A’s have shown us plans, haven’t really shown us financing or told us when groundbreaking is supposed to be, potentially within the next four weeks. Nothing is certain, though. And for the Rays, they’re even several steps behind in that process. Now, the A’s and Rays have also shown no sign of being for sale either by John Fischer of the former Oakland A’s and Stuart Sternberg of the Tampa Bay Rays. So, how does that go? If they’re not for sale, you can’t acquire those teams and have them relocate without either a deal to move them back or buying the team outright and then relocating them back. In this case, over to Orlando or back to Oakland. Major League Baseball is letting both teams right now, this is similar, play in temporary minor league situations. For the Rays, it was out of necessity, like Hurricane Milton ripped the roof off of Tropicana Field. But for the A’s, it was preference. They had a lease option for the Coliseum. I understand it was expensive, but that’s the nature of a short-term deal. It’s just going to be more expensive. And so, they went to Sacramento where there was no rent and the upgrades were paid for by somebody else. Major League Baseball, you would think, also has some urgency in terms of similarities here to get both of these franchises settled, to get them out of minor league ballparks, to get them in permanent stadiums and solutions. And so, if baseball does ever get the chance and opportunity to expand, they can do so. They cannot do so until these two teams are settled. But now we get into the difference here. I talked about why there wasn’t a group in Oakland putting something together, putting an option out there on the table pitching this, selling themselves. I go back to a quote by Warriors owner Joe Lake. This is October of 2023, so several years ago. I feel like this quote, which I’m about to read, and the next one after that, when you put them side by side in a direct comparison, it shows how passive potential investors might be in the Bay Area, how polite they’re being versus how forceful and upfront and straightforward I think they’re being in Orlando right now. Here’s here’s Joe Lake again, October of 2023. Quote, “We’ve over the years been obviously very interested. You all know that I’ve said it. And if for whatever reason A’s owner John Fischer decided it wasn’t going to work, sure, we might be interested in, you know, buying the Ace. But I’m not like throwing my hat in the ring, and I don’t want Major League Baseball to be mad at me either. So, I don’t want to get in their way. The takeaway from that, yes, I’d be interested. Yes, I’d want to do this, but I don’t want to be forceful because I don’t want to make anybody upset. Now look, maybe that’s just Joe Lick of being a nice guy. Maybe that’s just his tactic in all of this. But when you contrast it to what Andy Herdiska said, who is the Orlando Dreamers spokesperson, check this quote out. With numerous MLB teams experiencing stadium related challenges or indicating potential interest in selling, the Dreamers have multiple opportunities for potential MLB franchise acquisition, including landing one of the two expansion teams Major League Baseball will add this decade. Now, number one, adding an expansion team this decade, not so certain anymore from my opinion. But check this out. He’s literally saying there’s a lot of volatility and instability in numerous MLB teams right now. We’re going after those teams, those vulnerable teams. Can’t get a stadium deal done in Tampa or St. Pete. We’re going after the Rays. White Socks say they want to get out of Chicago. We’ll try and entice the White Sox. I do not think that Major League Baseball would ever have a team in Tampa and a team in Orlando 90 miles apart. Just doesn’t necessarily make sense to move somebody into that. But Andy is basically saying we’re going after them. The Dreamers have multiple opportunities for potential MLB franchise acquisition. And again, I’m not blaming the Dreamers for going over the edge here or being too much. I’m just saying I think if you really want to press the issue, this is how you do it. You put yourself out there. You take a chance. And this is where I begin my takeaways. Number one, there’s no guarantees for either Orlando or Oakland. But at least Orlando is taking a shot. And from the Oakland perspective, like what would it cost in this day and age of 2025 to put a put a group together to mobilize, to brand yourself, to put yourself out there, to acquire some investors, talk about a location, even loosely with the city of Oakland and the county of Alama to have a plan, a timeline. Here’s what we want. Here’s how we would do it. Showcase yourself. I understand there’s a sour feeling about losing Major League Baseball as it seems to have happened in Oakland, but this is also the time to say, “Well, let’s show you all of our cards here and how we would do it if there were an opportunity.” There is the ability to win over public perception at the very least and get some momentum on your side. And if you’re trying to prove something right or if you’re trying to prove who was really right in all of this, this is your chance. Show how easy it is. City of Oakland or investors or a group. There’s no committee on this. There’s no group on this. There’s no public or private group that’s even doing any of this. Being polite if that was the intent of any Oakland ownership group, right? And were they told maybe to stay quiet? Were they told, “Hey, lay low on this. We don’t, you know, baseball doesn’t like it when you ruffle our feathers and you talk about selling a team or putting something else together on your own. Orlando’s doing it. Nobody’s stopping them. And again, I’m not saying it’s 100% going to work for Orlando, but at least they’re taking a shot. And you can’t be polite about this. You can’t necessarily be totally courteous about this. You have to put yourself out there. You have to advertise this and promote this and be a little forceful about this. I also understand that Oakland has a lot bigger issues and a lot of things to sort out, real life issues, separate from just the fun and entertainment of a baseball team, a major league baseball team. But I don’t think this is unreasonable for an action committee to be put together by the city of Oakland or even a private group like what the Orlando Dreamers are. Who can put this together? Who can exist? Who can talk about this? who can inspire this and showcase this? Is there somebody out there? If there really is, are you going to be the the tortoise going slow, maybe not even going at all, or are you going to be the hair? Which one of these two? I know how the story book goes. I get it. I totally understand that. But which one do you think you want to be right now out of these two? because it’s clear to me that Oakland is just non-motivated, non-moving, not putting anything together in a place like Orlando in a similar situation is kind of going full throttle. So, let me know what you think about all this in the comments section below. Also, while you’re down there, thumbs up for this video since you made it here to the end. I appreciate that. And also, don’t forget to subscribe to this channel. Hit that button down below if you already haven’t. That way, I definitely get to see you back here next time.

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