Miami (AFP) – The Oakland Athletics will play at a minor-league baseball park in Sacramento for three years ahead of their planned move to Las Vegas, the MLB team said on Thursday.
The lease on A’s home at the Oakland Coliseum expires after the current baseball season and the proposed stadium in Vegas is not expected to be ready until 2028.
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Sutter Health Park is home of the Sacramento River Cats, the Triple-A affiliate team of the San Francisco Giants.
The temporary venue, which has a capacity of just 14,014, is 85 miles away from the Coliseum where the Athletics have played their home games since 1968.
In November, MLB owners voted unanimously to allow the team to move to Vegas.
“We explored several locations for a temporary home, including the Oakland Coliseum,” A’s owner and managing partner John Fisher said in a statement. “Even with the long-standing relationship and good intentions on all sides in the negotiations with Oakland, the conditions to achieve an agreement seemed out of reach. “We understand the disappointment this news brings to our fans, as this season marks our final one in Oakland. Throughout this season, we will honor and celebrate our time in Oakland, and will share additional details soon,” he added.
The Vegas plan emerged after the Athletics failed to reach a new deal to build a new stadium to remain in Oakland. Should the Athletics complete their relocation to Las Vegas, they will be the second Oakland sports franchise to move to the Nevada gambling haven from the city following the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders.
The last MLB team to relocate was the Montreal Expos who moved to Washington D.C. in 2005 and prior to that the Washington Senators became the Texas Rangers in 1972.
The Athletics franchise began in Philadelphia in 1901 and moved to Kansas City in 1954 and then to Oakland in 1967.
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