A's make moves with eye toward Las Vegas future

LAS VEGAS — The Athletics aren’t scheduled to play baseball in Las Vegas until 2028 at the earliest. They haven’t even broken ground on the land where they intend to build their ballpark on, though they say that’s coming.

In the meantime, you have an opportunity to put down a deposit to purchase season tickets come 2028 — three full years from now. Starting Friday, you can secure your spot to watch the Las Vegas Athletics in what will be their $1.75 billion home. At least that was still the cost as of Thursday when the team met with officials from the Las Vegas Stadium Authority to update them on what is going on and show some updated renderings of the future stadium.

The price? Just $19.01. The move nicely coincides with the team’s visit to Las Vegas Ballpark as part of Big League Weekend this Saturday and Sunday vs. Arizona.

Why $19.01? That’s the year the A’s started their somewhat nomadic existence in Philadelphia. They have since moved to Kansas City, Oakland and temporarily, to Sacramento, before settling in on the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue.

Obviously, $19.01 is a very nominal sum. It’s essentially lunch at Chipotle or coffee for two at Starbucks. You won’t even notice it.

But then one day, you’ll receive an email from the A’s. It’ll be in the form of an invoice. You’ll be among the lucky ones who can buy those season tickets. And when you see the cost at the bottom of the invoice, make sure you’re sitting down. We don’t want anyone to fall from fainting and hurt themselves.

You’ll be asked to pay thousands, depending where you decide to sit. Hopefully, your credit card will be fully loaded or you hit a big jackpot playing video poker in your neighborhood bar.

See, the A’s aren’t telling you yet what the final cost is going to be, mainly because they don’t know themselves what they’re going to charge. But eventually, they will figure it out and when you find out, well, just be prepared.

The new stadium will seat only 33,000. Within that capacity are suites, club seats and luxury boxes. If you’re counting on landing affordable seats, I wouldn’t get my hopes up. There simply aren’t that many cheap seats available.

And while you’re saving up for season tickets, make sure you put a lot of bucks aside for parking. The new stadium isn’t going to have an abundance of available spots and it will be pretty pricey when you pull into the MGM Grand garage across the street from the ballpark and it’s $50 or something like that. It’ll make the $35 the Golden Knights charge for parking seem like a bargain.

And sorry, there’s no subway to ride to the game. There hopefully will be bus service from around the valley like there is for Raiders and Golden Knights games where it costs $2 each way. That would be a viable option., So would the Las Vegas Monorail which stops at the MGM and would be an easy walk across the street to the ballpark. Of course you’ll have to drive to the Monorail or wherever the express bus picks you up.

Hopefully, the A’s will try to make some tickets affordable on a single-game basis. The Yankees, of all teams, have a $5 ticket for many games if you use a Mastercard and type in an online code. Granted, the seats aren’t great and there’s 20,000 more seats in Yankee Stadium than there’ll be in the A’s new ballpark. But if the A’s can offer, say a $10 ticket and partner it with a $4 round-trip bus ride to the stadium, that’s a $14 outlay and well within reach of just about everyone’s budget.  

But if you love baseball and you want to be part of history, don’t let me stop you. By all means, plunk down that $19.01 and get on the list to buy a season ticket to the Las Vegas Athletics. Just make sure to read the fine print when the bill arrives.
Meanwhile, Thursday brought what appears to be positive news for the Athletics’ future in Klas Vegas. The team announced it had hired Marc Badain as president to replace David Kaval, who left in December.

Badain had helped facilitate the Raiders’ move to Las Vegas from Oakland and oversaw the construction of Allegiant Stadium. He knows how government in Clark County and Nevada works and he has the trust of those involved in the process.

Most recently, he was involved with the Oak View Group’s attempt to build an arena to help lure an NBA team to Las Vegas.

This is a smart hire by the A’s and Badain should help navigate any bumps in the remaining process in getting the ballpark built. Hopefully he’ll find a way to make prices affordable for those who are plunking down $19.01 to be a season ticket holder.