Former A's Player Thinks A's Will do Fine in Las Vegas
Former Oakland A's outfielder Eric Byrnes made an appearance on Foul Territory on Wednesday, and was asked about the A's relocation situation. In typical Byrnes fashion, he was a bit all over the place.
He started off by reminiscing about his time in Oakland. "I used to like to say we had the best 12,000 fans in all of baseball...The Oakland A's fans are there. They always have been there."
He then talked about how when he first started his career in 2000, the A's were talking about getting a ballpark then, too, and it hasn't happened in the 24 years since. He says you can blame whomever you'd like, but the bottom line is, there's no stadium.
"So you had to do something. Sure enough, Manfred came out and he's like, 'look. It hasn't been able to get done.' Was the plan to move to Vegas all along? Maybe it was. But at this point, I'm probably, and I live up in Tahoe now, it's a lot easier for me, if we were to take the family to a game, I'd hop on a flight I'm [and] in Vegas in 45 minutes. I think it would be awesome to go down there and see them as opposed to the Coliseum."
Byrnes also expressed his displeasure with the comments made by the Mayor of Las Vegas when she said that the team should remain in Oakland.
The former A's outfielder clearly has love in his heart for the A's and their fans, but he is thinking about what would be best for him and his own experience in getting to a baseball game, not the fans that showed up 24 years ago to cheer him on and what they are going through.
At the end of the A's portion of his time on the show, Byrnes even dropped a story about how himself and Warriors owner Joe Lacob belonged to the same club ten years ago, and he reached out to Lacob when there were rumors swirling that the NBA owner was interested in buying the A's and keeping them in Oakland. Byrnes wanted to be a part of that if it came to fruition. He was told by Lacob that he'd be welcome aboard, but that the team just wasn't for sale.
Byrnes had a lot of hot takes about the A's situation and how well they'd do in Las Vegas based off of the success of the Golden Knights and the Raiders, and as always, he brought the energy. You can check out the full clip below.