- The Oakland A's broke ground for a new stadium on the Las Vegas Strip.
- Several cities, including Salt Lake City, are competing for possible baseball expansion.
- The Tampa Bay Rays are in talks to sell the team to a Jacksonville developer.
The Oakland Athletics are languishing in last place in the American League West as they play the first of at least three seasons in a minor league ballpark in Sacramento.
But there was a bright spot Monday as the team broke ground on a new $1.75 billion stadium in Las Vegas, expected to be completed in time for Opening Day 2028.
A’s owner John Fisher and other dignitaries, including MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred and Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo, put a gold shovel with a baseball bat handle into the ground on the southeast corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue to mark the occasion, per MLB.com.
“We are a Vegas team,” Fisher proclaimed.
The arrival of the A’s would give Las Vegas four major professional sports teams, joining the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders, NHL’s Vegas Golden Knights and the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces. And Lebron James has talked several times about wanting to add an NBA expansion team to the Sin City lineup.
Nevada and Clark County approved up to $380 million in public funds for the 33,000-seat stadium — the smallest in the league — on the Las Vegas Strip.
“I have no doubt this is done in 2028,” team president Marc Badain said, per the Associated Press. “You know the workforce here; they’re all here and ready to get going.”
Las Vegas would also rank as the smallest media market in the league, but Manfred said what the city’s constant tourism makes up for its lack of size, according to MLB.com.
“I think that the demographics, the success that other sports have had, and the amount of tourism here, those three legs of the stool make this an ideal market for us,” Manfred said. “I have no doubt that this team is going to be really successful in Vegas.”
When will major league baseball expand?
While Las Vegas will soon \become an MLB city, others, including Salt Lake City, are putting themselves in the on-deck circle should baseball expand.
Manfred has said he anticipates having a two-team expansion process in place by January 2029 when his term ends. He prefers expansion over relocation with one team in the East and one in the West.
The commissioner hasn’t said much about growing baseball lately, though in April he singled out one city as a “good candidate.”
“It almost goes without saying at this point that Nashville’s a candidate, and a good candidate,” Manfred told reporters after a panel discussion, per The Tennessean. “I have learned that saying too much about any potential expansion candidate sets off a chain of phone calls from everybody. So I’m just going to leave it there.”
Some baseball observers see Nashville and Salt Lake City as the top contenders.
Public money for stadiums
Last year, the Utah Legislature passed a bill that would increase the state’s rental car tax to raise $900 million for a stadium on Salt Lake City’s west side as part of mixed-use development the Larry H. Miller Company is building. The company is spearheading a push to bring major league baseball to the city through Big League Utah, a group of prominent business and political leaders.
“I think expansion is taking a bit of a backseat to other priorities that Major League Baseball is dealing with. They know where we are and we have a dialogue with them. But we also respect that there will be a process and that that process hasn’t begun yet. The worst thing we can do is try to force ourselves into a conversation when that conversation is not ready right now,” Steve Starks, Miller Company CEO, told the Deseret News last fall. “We have done everything we can to this point to be the most prepared market for potential expansion and we’ll continue to do that.”
Earlier this month, Oregon lawmakers showed they’re serious about trying to attract a big league team to Portland. They passed a law to allocate $800 million in bonds to help fund the construction of an MLB baseball stadium on Portland’s South Waterfront. The Portland Diamond Project, the group looking to bring baseball to the Rose City, lobbied hard for the bill.
Backers say the proposed stadium would boost Portland’s struggling economy, creating jobs and attracting fans.
“SB110 is a bill that everyone can support,” state Sen. Mark Meek, D-Gladstone, said in a statement, per Oregon Public Broadcasting. “Major League Baseball in Oregon means jobs, development, and long-term investment. With SB110, we’re ready to compete, think big and deliver.”
Other potential MLB expansion sites include Montreal, Orlando, Charlotte and San Antonio.
Manfred has said he wants the A’s and Tampa Bay Rays stadium situations settled before the expansion process begins.
What’s happening with the Tampa Bay Rays?
Like the A’s, the Tampa Bay Rays are playing in a minor league stadium after Hurricane Milton shredded the roof of Tropicana Field and local government plans for a new ballpark fell through. Whether the team ever returns to the St. Petersburg stadium remains up in the air.
Sportico reported last week that the Rays are in “advanced talks” to sell the team to a group led by Jacksonville developer Patrick Zalupski for $1.7 billion. It’s unclear whether the team would move to Jacksonville.
Manfred has said numerous times that the league is committed to keeping a team in the Tampa Bay market. The Tampa/St. Petersburg area ranked 11th as a TV market in 2023-24 and 17th for population in 2023, while Jacksonville is 41st and 38th, respectively, per Yahoo Sports.