There was no formal movement on the A's stadium situation during MLB's quarterly owners meetings, which concluded Thursday in N.Y. Both the A's and Giants made presentations Wednesday to MLB's Exec Council, further articulating their opposing positions on the A's bid to move to San Jose. MLB Commissioner Bud Selig declined to say whether the league would approve the A's relocation. Selig: "This is a complex, complicated issue. ... The idea is to get it right even if it takes a little longer." Pressed further, Selig said, "I don't really want to say any more about it. We're handling it the way we should" (Eric Fisher, SportsBusiness Journal). However, Selig said Thursday that it is "up to A's owner Lew Wolff to decide whether to consider additional sites for a new ballpark for the Athletics, leaving open the possibility of a move outside the Bay Area." He added, "It depends where they'd be. They could be all over the world, for that matter. They need approval. We have to go through an approval process. It just depends on where they're moving to" (AP, 5/17). SPORTING NEWS' Anthony Witrado wrote Selig "might as well have said he doesn’t give a damn about the franchise, because that is how that statement reads." As things stand, "it just looks like the league doesn't care about one of its most barren franchises." Looking forward, it seems that moving the A's to San Jose "would benefit baseball, relieving it of a small-market team dependent on the other money-making clubs for its well being and transforming it into an entity capable of sustaining itself." Witrado: "Now the A's will continue to flop. ... This is only such a mess because baseball refuses to clean it up" (SPORTINGNEWS.com, 5/17).
DOCKED IN THE BAY: In San Jose, Mark Purdy writes, "Selig was being as definitive as he ever is. Which means, not at all." Wolff and A's investor John Fisher Thursday "expressed no interest in leaving the Bay Area or selling the team." Wolff said, "Number one, my only objective is to remain in the Bay Area. And, based on all our studies -- plus receiving no indication from the blue-ribbon committed that we've missed anything -- the only location we can find to build a ballpark that's do-able is in downtown San Jose. I intend to do that. And we intend to invest half a billion dollars in private funds to do so." Purdy notes the franchise is "making money every year because of a favorable lease at the Oakland Coliseum and MLB's revenue-sharing formula." MLB Giants President & CEO Larry Baer and BOD Chair Charles Johnson, the team's leading stakeholder, could "solve matters quickly by being more amenable to a settlement of some sort." But many suspect that their ultimate goal "is to drive the A's out of the Bay Area, leaving the market solely to the Giants." Oakland officials said that they have "identified several potential ownership groups." But Purdy asks, "Why would Wolff sell the A's and let new owners take advantage of a new facility he's tried in vain to get built in Oakland?" Wolff and Fisher "may decide to force the San Jose issue through legal channels," but for now, the A's "aren't going anyplace" (SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, 5/18). The S.F. Chronicle’s Scott Ostler said Selig's comments were "almost delusional. He’s not making any sense. This committee he talks about has become an embarrassment." The Oakland Tribune’s Monte Poole said, “I think they sell this team before they end up moving to San Jose.” He added, “It’s still a possibility they will try and hang on for as long as they can" (“Chronicle Live,” Comcast SportsNet Bay Area, 5/17).
NO MEANS NO: In S.F., Gwen Knapp writes three years into its "static work, [Selig's] blue-ribbon panel on the future of the A's has come to seem like a child's imaginary friend." The marriage between the city and the A's of 44 years "has been disintegrating, but it might not be as irreparable as Lew Wolff and his silent fellow owner, John Fisher, would like everyone to believe." In the "right spot, a baseball park can revitalize a city center, as the Giants' 12-year-old stadium has revamped South of Market." Wolff and Fisher's "lust for San Jose has been stoked by the belief that it can generate significant corporate backing, far more than Oakland can hope to produce in the 21st century." But Knapp writes, "No decision means 'no' to the A's. They aren't getting the rights to San Jose, not yet, not soon, not even over Larry Baer's stone-cold corpse" (S.F. CHRONICLE, 5/18).
