Share
The Oakland A’s are another baby step closer to moving to Las Vegas. We last heard about the possible move in June when the team was approved for up to $380 million in financial assistance from Clark County and Nevada.
The process of the A’s possibly moving to Las Vegas has started and stopped numerous times over the past couple of years. Waiting a few months for the A’s to take another small step isn’t much of a surprise at this point.
Well, the Major League Baseball (MLB) team finally submitted a relocation application to a small committee of team owners. Don’t get too excited about the moving process nearing an end.
Even if the relocation application receives approval from MLB, the A’s playing in Las Vegas is still years away.
Who will review the A’s submitted relocation application?
The A’s relocation application will first be reviewed by a small committee of owners. The current committee is comprised of:
- Philadelphia Phillies chief executive officer John Middleton
- Kansas City Royals CEO John Sherman
- Milwaukee Brewers chairman Mark Attanasio
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred is the chair of the relocation committee.
The first small group will evaluate the relocation application. They will then make a recommendation to Manfred and an eight-person executive council.
This group of executives will suggest a recommendation for all 30 MLB teams. At this point, each team will finally vote on whether or not the A’s can move to Las Vegas.
For the A’s to move to Las Vegas least 75% of the voters must approve the relocation application.
Where will the A’s play in 2025 after the current lease ends?
There’s no timeline for any votes for the A’s relocation application. Like the rest of the moving process, this could drag on.
The A’s lease to play baseball in the current Oakland stadium ends after the 2024 season. It’s likely the A’s will play the 2025 season elsewhere.
There’s still a possibility that the team could begin play in 2025 at Las Vegas Ballpark in Summerlin. The Las Vegas Aviators, an A’s minor league affiliate, currently play home games in the baseball stadium across from Red Rock Casino.
The A’s could join the Aviators at Las Vegas Ballpark until a new stadium is ready on the Vegas Strip. Bally’s and the A’s have an agreement to build a stadium on land where the Tropicana currently operates.
It’s been widely speculated that the A’s would move into a new Las Vegas stadium in 2027 since talk about the A’s moving to Las Vegas started heating up in April. It appears as though that target has been pushed back to 2028.
Given the moving timeline, this could always get moved back again while the team and league take their time making a decision.
A’s select Las Vegas stadium construction team
To obtain financial assistance from Nevada, the Oakland A’s team cooked up a very unrealistic stadium rendering to show government officials.
The #Athletics have hired Mortenson | McCarthy as the construction manager for the Club’s proposed ballpark in Las Vegas. pic.twitter.com/2TR0iEyB5U
— Oakland A's (@Athletics) August 21, 2023
The stadium in the rendering above occupies all of the Tropicana land. It doesn’t have a hotel or casino or anything else one might expect. Regardless of the accuracy of this rendering, government officials approved funding.
To their credit, the A’s have finally chosen legitimate companies to oversee stadium construction if the team receives approval to move to Las Vegas.
The team overseeing the construction of the stadium might ring a bell. Mortensen and McCarthy Building Companies is the joint venture of two companies that oversaw the construction of Allegiant Stadium.
The team will have the same duties for the construction of the A’s stadium. Mortensen and McCarthy Building Companies will manage all construction-related activities for the venue.
Before this becomes official, the Las Vegas Stadium Authority must approve this selection.
Playing the waiting game again
There’s not much to do right now about the A’s move but sit around and play the waiting game again.
MLB controls the next step. Unfortunately, the league has no timeline for when its owners will vote on the A’s relocation.
Maybe McCarthy Building Companies will give fans of the baseball team and Las Vegas residents some eye candy in the meantime. The company could offer a more realistic rendering of what an MLB stadium could actually look like if it’s built on the land where the Tropicana is operating.
Let’s just sit back and relax while the MLB executives take their time reviewing the A’s application to relocate to Las Vegas.
