Zac Electrifly

There has been a lot of drama surrounding the Oakland Athletics and the Oakland Coliseum for a long time now. The Coliseum will not be renovated or replaced. A new stadium will not be built in Oakland. A new stadium will be built in Las Vegas. Construction has not started and will not start until next year or so for their new stadium. The A’s are leaving the Oakland Coliseum after next season. Their lease is up in December of 2024 and they will be gone. Their new stadium will not be ready by then. Where will they play?

The Oakland Athletics Triple-A affiliate are already in Las Vegas. The Las Vegas Aviators have been the A’s Affiliate since 2019. They just built the 10,000 capacity Las Vegas Ballpark. Right now the Las Vegas Ballpark is the front runner to become the A’s home stadium when they move to Las Vegas. They would be sharing it with their Triple-A affiliate. However since baseball has an insane amount of games, a single ballpark can not fit two teams at the highest and second highest levels of the sport. With eighty one home games it has come up that the Athletics could split their home games between Las Vegas and Reno. The Reno Aces of the Pacific Coast League (same league as the Las Vegas Aviators) have a stadium that could work for MLB games. Reno has the roughly 10,000 capacity Greater Nevada Field.

Could the Athletics play in Reno? Yes. It is possible for any MLB team to play at Greater Nevada Field. From what I understand Triple-A ballparks are set up with similar features for the players to make it easy for players to go back and fourth. So playing in Reno isn’t too different from playing in any Major League ballpark for the players. I don’t think that Reno is in a position to host A’s games at Greater Nevada Field. The capacity is small compared to Major League ballparks. I think that could cause a lot of issues. I don’t think Greater Nevada Field is currently prepared to handle Major League games. I think tickets will sell out almost instantly. There are a lot of A’s fans in Reno. Baseball is huge here in Northern Nevada. I think a lot of people will want to go to experience the history of what is going on. Being so close to Oakland, the Bay Area, and Northern California will also bring in a lot of people. There will be a lot of people from Northern California that will come up just for the experience of going to the casinos and going to the A’s game. That doesn’t even include the other teams fans who will come in because Reno is a tourist destination. I figure about 15,000 to 20,000 people will be interested in going to each game with only 10,000 people getting in. I figure thousands of people will head to the ballpark and be in that area even if they are outside of the ballpark. I think a lot of people will flock to downtown to go to a casino or bar or whatever to watch the game. If the San Fransisco Giants come to town I could see interest double or triple. Almost everyone in Reno is a Giants fan. I think it could be a boost to our local economy. I don’t think that Greater Nevada Field or the City of Reno are prepared right now for the amount of people on that scale on a consistant basis in that area.

The Athletics have not talked to Reno. As of writing this the mayor of Reno stated that the A’s have not reached out to the City of Reno. I have also had other sources from Greater Nevada Field confirm that the A’s have not spoken to them either. There is also little possibility that Greater Nevada Field would expand just for the Athletics. Even if the Athletics played all of their home games in Reno for three to four years it is unlikely that Greater Nevada Field will significantly expand their capacity. Right now greater Nevada Field does not have a lot of room for expansion. Any expansion lasting more than the offseason would not be worth it. Any expansion Greater Nevada Field would do for this would become obsolete the moment the A’s ballpark in Las Vegas is finished. However it is still up in the air right now what the A’s will do come 2025. If the Athletics play home games in Reno they will be the first Major Profession sports team to play in Reno outside of exhibition matches.

What do you think? Should the A’s play games in Reno? Should the A’s move out of Oakland? Let me know.