Eric Chavez is ready, so is Bud Selig
Posted By Jeff Fletcher on March 30, 2009 1:17 pm
Two interesting developments this morning. Eric Chavez said he will “definitely” be ready for opening day. That’s not a shocker, because everything had been headed in that direction for a week or so. Still, it’s nice to hear Chavez say it, because he’s not always the most optimistic guy.
Also, Bud Selig has created a committee to look at the “Oakland” situation. The guess here is that is the first step toward Selig removing the Giants’ territorial rights to San Jose.
Bud and Lew are buddies. If Lew wants to move the A’s to San Jose, Bud will make it happen.
I never really understood the value of the of “territorial rights” especially in today’s market. With TV, on-demand sports packages, and internet, fans from around the globe can follow their team. Territorial rights provide no benefits for the fans that I can see. Do major league teams, sharing an area, focus their marketing resources more heavily in their own territory? I don’t think so.
The only leverage territiorial rights gives a team is when they are trying pursue a new stadium, or trying to prevent an outside team from pursuing a stadium. The Nationals/Orioles situation was a little different, in that Baltamore was the only show in town. The A’s are a well established entity in the bay area, and would actually be moving farther away from the Giants ballpark. San Jose makes sense for the A’s, makes sense for MLB, makes sense for San Jose, and I doubt it would hurt the Giants in any way. The only reason I see for the Giants putting up a fight is to extract money from MLB and/or the A’s.
The territorial rights thing is not about fans, its about corporations and business sales reps. Big companies love to take clients to sporting events as a way to network and do business, the Giants know that the companies in San Jose wont buy luxury boxes at att if there is a closer, and newer, stadium. that does represent a real loss in money, because these deals are often long term contracts. We may see an increase in luxury box sales from east and north bay companies, but San Jose represents a huge amount of businesses and currently only has one pro franchise. I get the reasoning, but would hate to see the A’s leave the bay area entirely. why cant they build a bunch of parking structures, and then put the new stadium right next to the old one?
I agree with Lewis but I doubt that it will be that much of a hit. There are plenty of large corporate customers in San Francisco, and I would venture to guess they represent the lion’s share of the box seat revenue comes from close by corps.
Also, I would bet that the biggest corps will have seats at both stadiums.
The problem with building on the current stadium site is the Raiders, or more to the point Al Davis. If they A’s built a new stadium there (assuming they don’t get any objections from their co-tenant the Raiders and neighbors the Warriors), Davis would immediately press the city to upgrade the stadium or threaten to move for the eleventy billionth time.
I believe one of the early proposals was for a new stadium on the current site and was thrown out for some reason.
Now that Selig has official involvement I would suspect that the San Jose thing is going to move forward.
Agreed that the luxury boxes are a factor, but moving a team to San Jose makes a lot of sense for MLB. That the A’s granted the giants their territorial rights to pursue building a stadium in San Jose showed good will. The A’s have also done due dilligence in pursuing stadiums in Oakland and Fremont, each time being denied. Oakland is a good site from a logistical standpoint, but the complexities in dealing with Oakland politicians have closed that door, not to mention the legal wrangles that would be required in dealing with Al Davis.
I don’t hear the mayor of San Jose stating that the he doesn’t want the A’s because his city’s needs are meet by the Giants. Despite the late pleas from the Oakland politicians, there is more than enough past issues to take Oakland off the table as an alternative. Selig is about money. MLB money, not Giant’s luxury box money. San Jose makes sense for MLB in aggregate and that is where I think the A’s will end up.