Oakland says good riddance to John Fisher, but mourns the departure of their beloved A’s.

The Oakland Athletics’ upcoming series against the Texas Rangers will be the final games played in the historic Oakland Coliseum. It is a deeply sad moment. The A’s have been in the Coliseum since 1968, representing Oakland in the MLB for more than five decades. There are several chapters in A’s history, including stints in Philadelphia and Kansas City, but this team will forever be remembered as Oakland’s ball club.

Next season, however, the A’s will take their talents to a dinky minor-league stadium in Sacramento as they wait for a gaudy new complex to be built in Las Vegas. The plan is to move the A’s to Sin City by 2028, leaving their entire fandom, new and old, in a state of limbo until then. We don’t even know with absolute certainty that the A’s can actually move into their new Las Vegas home before the 2028 campaign. Funding issues have been rampant.

The new A’s stadium will require north of $300 million in taxpayer money. The excuses for leaving Oakland and its passionate fandom in the dust have come fast and furious over the years from A’s owner John Fisher and MLB commissioner Rob Manfred. Rather than working doubly hard to get a new stadium on the ground in the Bay Area, Fisher’s ambition led to the glitz and glamor of Las Vegas.

In one final act of disrespect, Fisher posted an open letter to A’s fans on Monday. In it, he claims the A’s ownership group “tried” to land a new stadium deal in Oakland, but was unable to for reasons he won’t explicitly state.

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John Fisher’s open letter to Oakland Athletics fans is sure to cause an uproar

We can read between the lines here. Fisher, whose net worth is $3 billion, along with his fellow Athletics stakeholders, were unwilling to foot the bill for a new stadium in Oakland. He “tried,” but he didn’t try very hard. His goal was the maximize profit and circumvent personal expense, not to really, truly keep the A’s in Oakland. I’m sure that would have been nice, but it’s hard to believe Fisher when he waxes poetic about the pain and disappointment of leaving for Las Vegas.

Oakland fans have been subject to condescending nonsense from Fisher for years now. The A’s are so afraid of their own fans that manager Mark Kotsay, a former A’s player who will go down in Oakland sports lore, can’t even speak to the fans after Thursday’s home finale. From USA Today‘s Bob Nightengale:

“Manager Mark Kotsay, who had planned to thank the crowd after the game, was advised to instead retreat to the clubhouse, according to one of his peers.”

The A’s are beefing up stadium security and encouraging players to get off the field as soon as the game ends. So, yeah, rather than any earnest attempt to celebrate the singular baseball history that has flowed through the Oakland Coliseum, the A’s are supplying a sort of scared “OK, bye” on their way out the door. It’s a total embarrassment for the league and specifically for Mr. Fisher, whose inability to commit to a city after almost two decades of ownership will alienate him (and his team) from one of baseball’s greatest fanbases.

In case you need a good laugh, here are some old renderings for the next A’s stadium in Las Vegas.