3 Reasons Why MLB Owners Should Vote No on Oakland A's Relocation to Las Vegas

Major League Baseball's owners are set to vote on Oakland A's relocation to Las Vegas some time between November 14-16

With the World Series in the rearview mirror, there is little time until Major League Baseball's owners are expected to vote on the Oakland A's relocation to Las Vegas at the owner's meetings from November 14-16. While the vote is expected to pass, there are still plenty of good reasons why this move still doesn't make sense for the A's, Las Vegas, or MLB. 

The first of those reasons is the simplest and also the most confounding: We just don't have enough details. We know the who and the where, but we're missing what, why, and how. What exactly is this project going to look like? Why leave the bigger market for the desert, and on top of that, why settle for nine acres when they could have had 55 acres at Howard Terminal? 

How this project is going to come together could lead to some theories on those questions, but how A's owner John Fisher is planning to pay for this ballpark, specifically, is also an unknown. He is apparently ready to sell some equity in the team (but how much?) in order to get this project across the finish line in Las Vegas, but why wasn't the same smaller scale project offered in Oakland, and why wouldn't he sell a stake in the team to a local investor to make it happen in the Bay Area? These are questions that have plagued A's fans since the initial "binding agreement" was announced in April. 

There is also the all important question of where the team is planning on playing games once their lease runs out at the Oakland Coliseum following the 2024 season. The Las Vegas ballpark is set to open for the 2028 season on their current timeline, but if there is a setback with demolition of The Tropicana, or the referendum takes hold in Nevada, then the A's could be looking at a fourth nomadic season before landing in Las Vegas. 

One year is likely pushing it for the Player's Union, but three or even four is a pretty tough pill to swallow. Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao has said that she would want an expansion team for the city in order to extend the A's lease at the Coliseum. While that may sound like a huge ask, MLB would be able to keep the Union appeased with that agreement, and John Fisher could continue to collect his annual $60 million RSN check from NBC Sports Bay Area/California. 

There are some other questions that need to be answered, like what the ballpark will look like, who the design team will be, and whether it will be a retractable roof or domed ballpark, but we will likely hear more about those plans in the next couple of weeks leading up to the vote. The design team is expected to be announced in November, and it would make sense if the A's made that announcement right before the vote (somewhere around Friday, November 10th perhaps), and one would assume that renderings would come with that announcement. 

Still, these are big questions that don't have answers and it's hard to grant the relocation process legitimacy when they could very well be left at "we'll figure it out" when the move is approved. 

The second big reason that at least some owners should vote no is because the San Francisco Giants will get the entire Bay Area to themselves. That has a major impact on the Los Angeles Dodgers, San Diego Padres, Arizona Diamondbacks, and Colorado Rockies, who share the NL West with the Giants. The Dodgers also have a good-sized fan base already in Las Vegas, and the A's move could encroach upon some of that territory and revenue for the club. 

The AL West teams also shouldn't be terribly happy, assuming the proposed move goes according to all of the flowery projections that have been made. If the A's are actually able to start raking in cash and put that money back into the club and the payroll, then they'd all of a sudden be more of a force to be reckoned with. Owners don't want more competition and they certainly don't want to spend more money. 

Then there are the big-earning clubs like the New York Yankees and Mets, among others, that pay into revenue sharing. The A's would theoretically be able to move off of revenue sharing by building a ballpark in Oakland, given that they already have an eager fan base that just wants an investment in the team, and the potential for revenue would be higher in Oakland, meaning that the club wouldn't need the handouts that they supposedly live off of now. 

The A's moving to Las Vegas would hurt a number of team's profits, and could even give their own competition a leg up on them, making this unwise both on and off the field. 

The final reason that owners should vote no isn't because Las Vegas doesn't deserve a team, but because Oakland deserves this team. Baseball will likely do well in Las Vegas, but if they're getting the A's, then any local enthusiasm is going to dwindle pretty quickly given how John Fisher has chosen to operate the club for nearly 20 years. 

The best course of action would be to help the A's get a deal done in Oakland and then expand to Las Vegas once that deal is done. The reason the vote is expected to pass, and why Fisher isn't being charged a relocation fee, is to make it easier for the deal to get done, and get the owners closer to the expansion fees that are on their way once the A's and Rays get their ballparks sorted out. 

While moving to Vegas may get the owners their expansion checks, there is no guarantee that it'll be quicker than if they had worked with the city of Oakland, and it likely wouldn't be as difficult with much less opposition to the project in the Bay Area. Allowing the move would also be short-sighted on Baseball's part. Vegas has shown that they will support an expansion team in the NHL's Golden Knights, but the jury is still out on local support for the Raiders. 

People like to point to the success of Allegiant Stadium as a reason why the A's relocation will also work, but baseball and football operate on completely different schedules. Baseball is played every day during the summer when temperatures regularly reach 120 degrees. The forecast in Las Vegas for this Sunday has a high of 77. Football is also played once a week, and there are only a handful of home games each season. How many people will honestly go to the ballpark, traveling across the sun, to see the Kansas City Royals play a game? Baseball doesn't have that kind of fan base. 

There is also the fact that the NBA seems primed to expand themselves in a year or two, and Las Vegas is a frontrunner to land on of the new franchises. By the time the A's ballpark opens up, or even shortly thereafter, they could be the fifth-best sports ticket in town behind the Knights, Raiders, Aces, and the NBA team. If MLB decided to expand into Las Vegas, then at least there would be a connection with the city that residents could feel a sense of ownership. A relocated team that has gotten the headlines the A's have? Hard to see many people wanting to claim that team. 

Again, the owner's vote is likely to pass, meaning relocation is set to be approved. That doesn't mean that it's a good deal for anyone involved. John Fisher deemed himself a "caretaker" of the franchise during one of his few media interviews this summer, and if the rest of baseball's owners feel the same way about their own franchises and the game as a whole, then expansion in Vegas is the best course of action. 

Leave the A's in Oakland where they belong.