A’s departure makes them the latest major pro sports team to abandon Oakland

After Thursday’s final game against the Texas Rangers, the Oakland A’s will become the latest– and possibly last — major professional franchise to leave the East Bay city.

It is a day sports enthusiasts and Athletics supporters have dreaded ever since Major League Baseball owners approved the team’s relocation to Las Vegas last November. Fans are planning a wake for the Athletics in the downtown Jack London Square neighborhood following Thursday’s sold-out home finale at the Coliseum.

Fans have made no secret of blaming team owner John Fisher as the main force behind the move to Las Vegas, and the team’s interim stint in Sacramento that begins next season. Frustrated A’s fans have been hanging banners, waving signs and wearing t-shirts emblazoned with the slogan “Sell the Team” or in some cases simply “SELL” at games all year.  

Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred insisted for years that the A’s needed a new ballpark to be a sustainable organization.  

A letter posted by the embattled owner on the team’s website Monday claiming he did all he could to try and keep the A’s in Oakland but failed elicited more scorn from an already enraged fan base.   

Painful departures of sports teams are not new to East Bay locals. Below is a look at each organization to leave Oakland, in order of departure and with details on each move:

California Golden Seals  

An NHL team from 1966-76, the California Golden Seals left in 1976 to become the Cleveland Barons after struggling to deliver a winning product in Oakland.

The Barons were a short-lived franchise, merging two years later with the Minnesota North Stars, who eventually relocated to become the Dallas Stars.

Golden State Warriors

Many players expressed mixed emotions after leaving Oracle Arena, an intimate venue nicknamed “Roaracle” next door to the Coliseum, for the move to Chase Center in San Francisco ahead of the 2019-20 season.

Golden State played at Oracle for 47 seasons, winning NBA championships 40 years apart in 1975 and 2015 as well as consecutive titles in 2017 and 2018 over the Cleveland Cavaliers. The team came close in 2019 during its final season in Oakland, but the then defending champions eventually fell to the Toronto Raptors in a heartbreaking Game 6 that saw Klay Thompson go down with a catastrophic torn ACL, the first of two major injuries that would keep the Splash Brother on the sidelines until January of 2022.

Despite all the new amenities and modern practice facility at Chase, it took time for the arena to truly feel like home. Coach Steve Kerr said it, Stephen Curry and Draymond Green, too.

Curry, the two-time NBA MVP and all-time 3-point leader, had to adapt his signature tunnel shot with the change of venue. Depending on the side where his team warms up, he now opts to either try a full-court heave or a shot from an entry way well above one corner of the court.

Oakland Raiders

Raiders owner Mark Davis wanted a football-only stadium and he got one in Las Vegas in Allegiant Stadium, which opened in 2020 and hosted the Super Bowl earlier this year.

The team has now left Oakland twice, having departed in 1982 for Los Angeles only to return in 1995 and then making the latest move to Nevada after getting approval from NFL owners in 2017. The team played one final season at the Coliseum in 2019 before inaugurating their Las Vegas stadium amid COVID.

At the Coliseum, the Raiders built “Mount Davis,” as it became known in reference to late owner Al Davis, a section of third-deck outfield seats that largely disappointed baseball fans who lost their picturesque views of the Oakland Hills and the intimacy of a smaller stadium.